


Man of the House

by lori (zakhad)



Series: Captain and Counselor [29]
Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-22
Updated: 2009-12-22
Packaged: 2017-10-05 00:37:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 51,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/35815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zakhad/pseuds/lori
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean-Luc Picard finally meets more history than he really wants. The Fifth House may never be the same. And it's a fair guess Lwaxana will always have fun at his expense, despite her finally coming to grips with his relationship with Deanna.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

  
Deanna went to the window. In the moonlight, the blossoms swayed together in the breeze. Her mother's garden. She'd stayed in this room each time she had come to Betazed, and she always looked out at the flowers in the night, and at the fountain spraying moonlit water at the other end of the lawn. This time was no different in that respect. Like always, she'd arrived from the space port, greeted Mother with a smile and a hug, and Homn had put her bags in her room. A few calls to friends after dinner. A few promises to meet some of them. The Festival of Alipha was nigh, and she would be seeing the gathered progeny of the Houses of Betazed, as she'd seen them at this same holiday before.

But this time, she had her husband along, and that changed everything. She worried about Jean-Luc's reaction to this trip. Knowing Betazoids in Starfleet wouldn't have prepared him for this, any more than knowing deLio would prepare him for visiting L'noris. She'd done her best, the rest would have to come by experience. Waiting another year might result in their not coming at all -- who knew where the ship would be then? He wanted to be here, to learn about her family and her childhood, as he'd taken her to France and shared his. His children's heritage would be Betazoid as well, he said. Better to learn now what that meant.

They had honeymooned six months ago in France, and she had sensed the uneasiness he'd felt and the paradigm shift he'd undergone. She was foreign to his world and it had taken time for him to see her having a place there. He'd barely perceived himself as having a place in Labarre. Now the opposite. She had to make a place on Betazed for him, at least in her thoughts. That shouldn't be so difficult. He definitely had a place at her side, and he wasn't the only Starfleet officer to ever attend the Festival.

The difficult part would be Jean-Luc's -- the Houses were the preservation of the ancient ways of Betazed, and the ancient ways were matriarchal. Even the most traditional of the traditional humans didn't seek to maintain unequal gender roles in the name of custom, and arranged marriages were looked upon with distaste. The reactions of her crewmates when Wyatt had appeared to make his claim had proved that -- Jean-Luc had even voiced his concern, less as a captain than as a friend. Though he had kept his words carefully formal, she had sensed his affection for her and dislike of the tradition. Nothing like the fury from Will, or the quiet confusion from Beverly. Jean-Luc might have felt that she made a mistake in agreeing to go through with it, but he respected her right to choose. As always.

Another difficulty for them on Betazed -- her family. Having her cousins and her mother all in the same room was enough of an adventure, but her mother, her cousins and Jean-Luc? It would be an 'interesting' experience. She hoped Plitty wouldn't bring her kitten.

She turned toward the bed when Jean-Luc sighed in his sleep, standing on the left -- always her side, because he always took the right out of some unspoken preference. He probably couldn't tell her why he wanted the right side. It just was, as were hundreds of other little things, habits and rituals they negotiated in mostly-unspoken ways. Sometimes she changed things just to see what he would do. When he set the table, he would put utensils in particular places, and she had adapted to that, but sometimes she switched them around. He noticed, going so far as to hesitate and glance back and forth with a little puzzlement, but he said nothing and even returned things to the places she'd assigned them when he put them down. And the next meal she would go back to his way, and again he would offer no comment. Endless games with no names, and no rules. She still smiled over the puzzled look on Will's face when she played the shirt button war with Jean-Luc. Thinking about what their friends would do if they witnessed the underwear relocation project could make her giggle, if she imagined the scenario.

Smiling, she smoothed her nightgown over her belly and sat on the edge of the bed. Yves fluttered briefly and settled down. Deanna focused briefly on him, touching the presence of her son, perceptible but not yet coherent. Then she looked at Jean-Luc and remembered their time on Telix -- a chance meeting of a future Yves, who had come back in time to prevent damage to the timeline by other time travelers. So much of his face had belonged to his father, especially his eyes.

She touched Jean-Luc's neck, there at the nape where she always did. He responded even in his sleep with a tickle of affection, sighing again and rolling toward her, ending up on his back. She picked up the covers and slowly got in, doing her best not to wake him. Once she'd settled on her side, he draped himself over her. His hand splayed across the growing bulge of five and a half months of pregnancy; he caressed it often enough when he was awake, and that he'd gravitate to it in sleep was no surprise.

The muktoks outside chimed distantly in the breeze. Jean-Luc mumbled something -- a course change. He was dreaming he was on the bridge, of all places. They'd left the ship at a starbase for the annual minor refit, under Geordi's watchful eye. Pushing the refit up to coincide with the Festival hadn't been difficult. Command had granted the request with the condition that, since the refit no longer conflicted with it, they should take an ambassador along to Adnalon for another try at negotiating formal relations with them. Something to look forward to with a resigned sigh -- this time, hopefully, she wouldn't have to eat a communicator.

Jean-Luc said something else, unintelligible this time. She whispered 'aye, sir' and he responded, predictably, with a mumbled 'engage.' He did make an amusing toy, but it would never do to let him know she wasn't kidding when she told him that.

Almost laughing out loud, she nestled closer in the curve of Jean-Luc's arm and realized he'd awakened, or at least partially so. Sometimes he did when she dared to play with him. Fortunately he never remembered what had roused him. His lips found her neck, drifted down her shoulder, and his fingers closed on a handful of her gown.

"Pen?" she asked softly. A moment later, delayed by sleepiness, he recognized the innuendo.

His husky chuckling tickled -- she loved the sensations of him at night, the half-waking murmuring softness of his emotions. When on leave where no red alerts could possibly interrupt, he allowed himself to relax completely. It had taken almost their entire honeymoon for him to do so, thanks to being at the chateau, but this location held no memories for him. This was new territory, populated by unfamiliar people, with only her mother to cause him uneasiness -- so far.

In the deep shadows thrown by the canopy over the bed, he pulled her over on her back, kissing her while his hands traveled in slow motion up her body. Their first night on Betazed, she'd expected lovemaking but hadn't complained when he'd been more interested in sleep; she was tired, too. The flurry of activity the week prior to leaving the ship had meant little relaxation for either captain or first officer. Then the two lieutenants who had come with them as ancillary flight crew for the gig in exchange for the ride had been an effective mood killer while on the way.

They had a week before heading back to the starbase; there would be time for relaxed love play. Although, he seemed intent on making it so right then. Still sleepy, almost on autopilot, and he wanted her. His mouth wandered down her throat and up again. Angling her head to avoid the collision of noses, she closed her eyes and received his kiss, twining her tongue around his, matching his leisurely pace.

He shifted again, and the hard length of his penis pressing against her right hip startled her. He hadn't seemed that aroused. His soft moan vibrated against her lips. He rubbed against her, then caught himself and felt uncertain, knowing she would read it as a query.

She almost rolled to face him but changed her mind, turned her back, tugged the gown up over her hips, wriggled out of the panties and used her toes to slide them off her leg. Whether his arousal or her bare butt pressing into his hips had done it, Jean-Luc was now fully awake. His right arm, the one she lay in, curled and his hand cupped her left breast; his left hand slid between her legs from behind, stroking the inside of her thigh before his finger explored gently along her labia.

His breath hot and irregular against the back of her neck, he guided himself inside her and reached forward, pressing his palm along her fan of pubic hair and tipping her hips to a more conducive angle. His erection sliding along inside her thrilled, sending a fluttering warmth radiating up her body, and a different warmth blossomed in her heart.

His hand moved up the underside of her thigh, raising her leg as he thrust deeper. Arranging her legs to give him better access, she clung to his arm across her chest until his left hand covered hers and guided it down her body. He flattened their hands along her belly for a moment while he slowly thrust again, the heart fire low but warm and close. Coiling his tongue against her shoulder, he moved her fingers past her parted outer labia. His fingers stayed, alternating with hers, guiding her in slow caresses of their joining, closing over her clit, gliding back and parting around the base of his penis as he thrust in again.

She rolled her head back against his, mouth open in ecstacy, transmuting the cry rising in her throat as he withdrew and thrust again into a low guttural gasp. His teeth on her neck brought another gasp.

He nipped her earlobe through her hair and pushed harder into her. Caressing, touching her, guiding her in touching him, them, he rocked slowly in, then out, kissing her neck and shoulder open-mouthed. She arced against him, catching her lip in her teeth and moaning. Her straining tipped him slightly backward.

Pushing back and mounding her breast in his fingers, he leaned until he could get the nipple in his mouth. Sudden, strong suction made her gasp again. Then he let go and propelled her forward with his weight on her back, withdrawing from her as he rearranged her beneath him.

She moved with him, in sync with his urges and intent, drawing one of the pillows down to prop herself on and cushion her belly even while he hesitated, querying silently for permission and reassurance that this was wanted and safe --a tentative fondling of her breasts brought a stifled moan from her. His chest hair brushed her back as he leaned, kissing her through the thin gown and pulling it up to her armpits.

"Déesse," he whispered, the word licking between her shoulder blades. She looked over her shoulder and saw nothing but shadow, and moonlight spilling through the window at the other end of the room. Plumping a pillow beneath her cheek, she shoved her knees into the mattress to provide a better angle and pushed against him, twisting her hips. His lips drifted along her spine briefly, then he rose on his knees and surged into her.

Deanna knotted her fingers in the sheet as he found a slow rhythm that wouldn't dislodge either of them. Quiet gasping from him -- awash in bliss and the sensations of hard, slick flesh pulsing into her, she made herself completely receptive until she sensed the rising urgency and then closed down on him. The resistance brought a harder thrust than before and more pleasure at the tightness. Mutual pleasure tightened her yet again, and again, as he rode deeper in.

He held on, a hand on her shoulder, the other on her thigh, and pushed all the way in -- held it there, on the verge but not willing to slip over just yet. So controlled. She needed release, the throbbing she felt almost hurt, and he could tell; at this point heart fire had risen to engulfment, and he was aware of her in almost the same depth as she was of him, though she doubted he could interpret what he sensed so well. His fingers slid around her thigh and up --

Pleasure, rippling outward from his fingertips through her body and trembling in her belly down low -- he sent her into orgasm and held firm while she shook and muffled a cry in the pillow. And again -- it took only moments to bring her back to the peak.

He brought her to climax a third time, manipulating and stroking as he resumed slow thrusts, and gripping her thigh again as he gave in at last to his own need. While enjoying her own pleasure she pulled on his, feeding herself with it, setting up more reverberations between them --

His climax felt like liquid fire. She could sense it as if it were her own, the shuddering expulsion and the heat, and he could sense her orgasm as well -- she got some of her pleasure back second-hand. Rising against him, she writhed and slid, skin against sweaty skin, until he steadied her with an arm thrown around her waist. In the glowing echoes of passion, they fell together in a heap. He rolled them on their sides, putting both arms around her and nipping her neck again.

The flames died to embers. He'd reached a sated state of well-being, but a flicker of questioning reached her. Deanna knew he would do whatever she required to ease the residual throbbing she felt. Being pregnant did it. They'd learned that she needed more attention to bring complete release, thanks to the increased blood flow to that area, hence his earlier efforts.

Sitting up, he retrieved the covers they'd knocked askew -- the room felt cold now that they weren't in the throes of lovemaking -- and drew them up to her shoulder, then leaned to kiss her cheek, running his hand beneath the blankets and down her back, pulling the gown straight.

"I'll be fine," she murmured, sensing it would be so. The throb had already dwindled in the time it took him to straighten the covers. Present, but not urgent. "Hold me?"

"As if you had to ask." The smile, invisible in the darkness, was present in his mumbled words.

Their emotions were slowly disentangling from each other, from oneness to togetherness, as he held her against his chest and enjoyed having her there. And only then did she take stock of the other two people in the house, and realize that her mother was awake. And aware.

&lt;MOTHER!&gt;

&lt;Oh, Little One, really. If you didn't want people to know, you shouldn't be so noisy!&gt;

Deanna reviewed the entire sequence of events swiftly. &lt;We weren't noisy. You're nosy! I don't believe you, how rude.&gt;

&lt;You woke me up, Deanna.&gt;

It occurred to her that her mother's room was upstairs, at the other end of the house. &lt;When you said noisy you meant telepathic noise? Are you serious, we actually woke you?&gt;

"Dee?" Jean-Luc propped himself up again, leaning over her shoulder. He could be more sensitive to her than she expected, sometimes. The faint moonlight caught him from behind, putting his head in silhouette and illuminating stray white hairs below the curve of his ear.

"It's all right, I'm just sensing someone else," she murmured. "I'm trying to block it out. Probably the neighbors."

"I thought Betazoids would be better at shielding themselves than that."

Deanna almost laughed at that, though it wasn't that funny. "Sleep, cher fish."

While he settled once more, Deanna composed herself and closed her eyes. &lt;Mother, what exactly woke you?&gt;

&lt;Can't we talk about it in the morning, dear? I'm going to have a hard enough time getting back to sleep now that you've woken me so pleasantly.&gt;

&lt;We will not talk about it in the morning! You know better. I won't let you embarrass him that way.&gt;

&lt;Oh, fine. You woke me at orgasm. The two of you manage to make a pretty impressive bonfire, I must say. I didn't know he had it in him.&gt;

&lt;Don't you dare say a word to him. One innuendo and we're finding a hotel.&gt; Deanna thought for a minute. &lt;Which orgasm?&gt;

&lt;Which. . . why you sly little one, how many did you have? I only sensed the one.&gt;

&lt;Go back to sleep, Mother. Good night.&gt;

Her mother's muted telepathic chuckle trickled through before silence was restored. At her back, Jean-Luc slept lightly, on his way into the normal sleep cycle of a human.

It had to have been that final merging of hajira her mother had sensed. When Deanna had begun a more intense, purposeful feedback loop -- that would have to be the last one of those she tried, at least while in her mother's house.

She tried to relax into sleep, and found herself listening to the muktoks outside in the breeze and the soft snore of her husband while thinking about Betazed and the times she'd been there. Her musings were interrupted by a light thump she mistook for a twitch of one of Jean-Luc's fingers, except even as she thought that, his hand flexed against her ribs, riding up under her breast. Sliding her hand down her belly, she waited, and felt it again -- and felt the bump against her palm as she pressed alongside her navel. Smiling, she took Jean's hand and guided it to the spot, pressing his fingers where her palm had been. The touch awakened him again and brought sleepy questioning until a moment later Yves kicked again.

Jean-Luc sat up, almost climbing over her, his excitement bringing him completely awake. She almost giggled at how intently he focused on the detection of another movement. It took a while, but Yves granted them one more movement his father could feel, in the midst of his usual fluttering calisthenics. Deanna could tell when he settled -- it was almost part of her subconscious, that sense of her baby inside her, but a ripple in the simple presence told her that soon his emotions would be discernable.

"He's going back to sleep," she murmured.

Jean-Luc didn't react outwardly, but an upwelling of joy washed over her from him. He stroked her belly then spooned at her back, kissing her neck through her curls. She fell asleep with him humming a tune she didn't recognize softly against her scalp.

\------------------------

He woke with a start. Somewhere in the distance, loud singing -- female. Betazoid. Off-key, at least to his ear.

The covers moved. Deanna sat up, her hair standing out from her head in all directions, and she squinted, getting her bearings. Inhaled.

"MOTHER! Stop it!"

The singing stopped. Groaning, Deanna fell back and lolled in the bed, frowning, eyes squeezed shut forcefully.

He laughed. Might as well, he felt like it. After last night, after feeling first perceptible kicking of his son -- a couple of weeks ahead of schedule, at that, though it really wouldn't have been that perceptible if he hadn't been paying close attention -- he could take whatever came along.

"Oh, shut up," Deanna mumbled, flopping over on her side.

"Poor petite. What would make it better, hm?" He almost rubbed her back but knew that until this mood passed he was better off avoiding direct contact. It only made her grumpier.

"I think -- oh, I hate this," she gasped, sitting up quickly. "Help. Air. The window, please, I can't -- "

"Open the window?" Already en route, he was nearly shoved aside by her rush forward. He undid the latch she fumbled at and pulled the pane aside, a rush of perfumed air flooding into the room from the garden. She leaned out and inhaled deeply.

"Thank you. The smell -- I almost threw up. I've noticed that lately strong smells have that effect, but why suddenly now, and not in the first trimester, I have no idea."

"What smell?"

She turned bleary eyes on him. "You don't smell it? Mother's cooking seblitzi for breakfast. Or rather, Homn is."

Now that she mentioned it, he could detect a faint odor reminiscent of burned meat. "I'm afraid to ask what that is. You won't be able to eat it, I assume."

She slapped her hand over her mouth and looked queasy at the thought. "Oh, god -- I can't stand that smell. I can't go out there."

"I'll get dressed and go, and have Homn fix something else for you. Let me move the chair over here." A large oval chair sat along the wall between the hall door and the bathroom; luckily it had a wooden frame. It looked like someone had grown a vine in the shape of a chair, in fact, then thrown a lumpy beige cushion into it. It took no effort to pull it across the room.

He left her collapsed in front of the window, hugging one of the cushions and eyes shut, and went in the bathroom. Emerging a short time later, he noted as he dressed that she snored lightly.

"Dee. . . ."

She turned her head his direction, but didn't open her eyes. "Hm?"

"What do you want for breakfast?"

Stretching like a cat, she peered through her lashes at him. "Evhi mifth."

"What the devil does that mean?" He'd heard of, and tasted, quite a few Betazoid foods, but this one was new. But she lapsed into another snore, her eyes drifting shut. He shrugged into a shirt and made his way to the other end of the house.

Lwaxana's house was large, full of air and light, cluttered with art and antiques from all over the quadrant, and while he didn't feel at home, he didn't feel particularly uncomfortable with it. Only when his hostess was in the room. From the hall he passed through the dining room, around the clunky wedge-shaped table, and pushed through the swinging door at the other end into the kitchen.

Lwaxana sat on the end of a counter, legs crossed, wearing a filmy pink robe over something brief and tight. She smiled and waved whatever long leafy thing she munched at him. "Good morning, dear. Where's Deanna?" Then she scowled merrily at him. "Don't tell me you wore the poor dear out!"

Checking himself before he burst out in self-defense had become habit just in one afternoon with his mother-in-law. Her teasing became more bothersome each time. All he could do was ignore it and hope someday she would stop trying to get a reaction from him. "The smell of whatever Homn's cooking made her ill. Another side effect of pregnancy -- apparently you've forgotten that one?"

"Homn, get rid of it, we need something less. . . oh, dear. Did she say what she wanted?"

"I have no idea what she said. It sounded like 'evhi mifth.' She's not a morning person, you know."

Lwaxana threw her head back and laughed, her amusement tumbling through the kitchen -- and to his dismay Homn actually joined her, just a few short booming chortles, but from him that was a belly laugh. "Oh, dear, no, she isn't. Poor Jean-Luc -- she just told you to perform -- well. Physically impossible, but never you mind. She can eat when she feels up to it, but in the meantime, let's get you something. Homn -- something with less aroma, Terran, perhaps. And do air out the house for poor Deanna."

She hopped down and opened a door, gesturing for Jean-Luc to follow. He found himself shortly thereafter on a terrace outside the kitchen, being served tea and various foodstuffs by Homn, facing Lwaxana across a round white table while swaying blossom-laden branches dipped in the breeze to tap him on the head. The hundredth time it happened he snatched and twisted, and before he knew it he held the end of the branch in his hand. He stared at it a moment, then jammed it in the vase of flowers Homn had added to the table on his fourth trip out.

"Sorry."

Lwaxana shrugged. "You had to take it out on something. Really, do I frustrate you that much?" She waved the last bite of her leafy stalk at him and popped it in her mouth.

He put down the teacup and sat back, considering, looking around them and up at the sky. "Do you have to practice, or does exasperating behavior come naturally to you?"

She laughed again, picking up her cup to salute him. "Now that we're not being diplomatic, you finally say what you think."

"Oh -- believe me, I'm being diplomatic." Thoughts of last night's rush out to greet them and the overly-affectionate hug she'd given him marched briefly through his mind. At least Deanna had had the grace not to giggle while he washed the lipstick off his cheek.

Homn brought out plates. When he went inside again, Jean-Luc rested his chin in his hand, one arm across his chest to prop his elbow on, and stared at the blackened items on the plate in front of him.

"I think these are pancakes," Lwaxana said helpfully.

"I think you've let Homn try to teach Deanna to cook."

Lwaxana gaped at him. "Now that's not nice! What a thing to say about your wife. Homn isn't used to cooking Terran food, that's all, and Deanna probably isn't, either."

His haphazard, occasional awareness of Deanna flamed into being, warning him of her approach. His head turned a moment before she appeared in the door. Moving as if she hurt all over, she shuffled out and nearly fell into the chair he pulled out for her. The sash of her pink robe looked uncomfortably tight around her waist. She looked at him, at the food on his plate, and covered her face with both hands.

"Homn," Lwaxana called, gesturing and making the servant remove the plates when he came outside. She leaned and gripped her daughter's arm. "Are you all right, dear? Maybe you should be in bed."

"Fine, I'm fine -- it's just worse this morning for some reason. It will pass."

"You don't have to referee, you know," Jean-Luc said. "Your mother was explaining what you meant by what you told me this morning, just before I left."

She blinked at him, then began to cry. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it! I wasn't thinking, you were being so thoughtful and I -- "

"Dee, stop it. You never mean what you say before breakfast. Go back to bed."

In one of her more random turns of mood, she glared at him -- the tears weren't even dry, and she was angry. "Don't tell me what to do!"

"Are you hungry?"

"I have to eat something." Pouting, now. This was the worst she'd been in a while.

He picked up his tea and waved it under her nose. She flinched away from it, making a face. "That's what I thought. I'll bring you a slice of bread later. Go take a hot bath, it'll make you feel better."

Still pouting, she went inside with less than her usual grace. Jean-Luc noticed Lwaxana watching him.

"What?"

Unusually sober, she picked up her tea and contemplated it. Then a smile, but a pale imitation of her usual cheer. "She said she hadn't had much morning sickness. Are you certain there's nothing wrong?"

"She's been more sensitive to emotion, and a little sensitive to smells, but the two seem to be alternating from time to time. The mood swings are normal."

Lwaxana nodded, accepting it with welcome seriousness. "She said you were naming him Yves. Is that French?"

"It's the masculine form of my mother's name."

"I see." She sipped, reached for the teapot, and refilled hers, leaning across to refill his at the same time. "Now that I've had some time to. . . accept this, I've decided that marrying you was a good thing for her to do. Much better than her idea of coming home and going through with that ridiculous plan of hers. I told her raising a child on her own would be difficult, but you know how she is, stubborn -- I've surprised you?"

Homn brought out something different yet again. At least it wasn't burnt, but Jean-Luc barely tasted it. And, he realized at last, he hardly looked at his hostess -- a quiet comment from her alerted him to that.

"We certainly won't need a referee if you keep staring at your plate like that. I didn't realize she hadn't told you, Jean-Luc. I'm sorry."

"No, I'm sorry -- I hadn't intended to be a rude guest. It caught me off guard. No harm done. This Festival -- Deanna told me what to expect, in some detail. Are you certain you wouldn't rather I stayed out of it?"

Lwaxana wiped the corner of her mouth with a napkin. "Are you certain you want to attend?"

"I'd like to understand it. I've been in space long enough to know that you can't simply read an article and expect to know anything useful about such ceremonies."

"Well, dear, you do realize that as determined as you are, there's no way you would actually be able to *participate* in it. You simply aren't Betazoid."

"But Deanna is, and my children will be, to some degree. It's worth observing, at least."

An odd smile twisted her lips briefly. "Well. You brought something suitable to wear, I hope?"

"My dress uniform will suffice, she said."

"Yes." She looked down, then erupted into something like her usual exuberant manner. "I hope you change your mind about bringing her home to Betazed. She really ought to be with family, Jean-Luc, certainly you can appreciate -- "

"I can, but it simply isn't feasible. We can't always predict where the ship will be. We're scheduled to be conducting surveys at that time, but one never knows where -- "

"Which is precisely my *point* -- having children in space is so *dangerous*! You don't know what will happen or -- "

"It's her choice, Lwaxana. You can't think that I made it for her. And don't start again about my patriarchal upbringing." A safer position than discussing the fact that it had been a joint decision. Last night's welcome had quickly turned into a dissertation on how much better it would be if Deanna would stay on Betazed with Yves, and devolved into a debate on Terran verses Betazoid child-rearing practices.

"You're her captain," she exclaimed, waving a hand as if throwing the words at him. "You know she'd do anything -- "

"Our personal lives are not controlled by the professional any more than they have to be. She's an excellent officer but she knows exactly where the lines are drawn. She makes her own decisions and I respect them."

"Well." She subsided too easily, he thought. "You told her to take a bath -- muscle aches, I presume. You should go help her, a good massage works wonders -- I do remember that much of what it's like. Take some of the pastry. Maybe she'll be able to eat now."

Dismissal, but one he concurred with. Tossing the napkin on his empty plate, he rose and went inside. He hesitated in the kitchen, scanning the countertops for leftovers. Homn had gone elsewhere already, leaving him to wonder where in the kitchen the pastries, or anything else, could be hidden. Rather than hunt through all the cupboards for a stasis unit -- it appeared that usual appliance was camouflaged well -- he turned around to ask Lwaxana.

He stopped in the door. The unflappable Ambassador Troi stood at the edge of the terrace, overlooking beds of flowers, hugging herself. Her shoulders moved, just once, but in a manner that told him she was crying.

He backed quietly into the kitchen and opened a few cupboards. Leaning on the counter a moment, he furrowed his brow. {Where are those blasted pastries?}

A few moments of waiting, and he tried another door.

"Over here." Lwaxana came inside as he turned, the morning sun at her back. Still hugging herself, until she opened one of the doors along the back wall to reveal the elusive pastries, as well as a variety of other perishables.

"Thank you." He took a handful, popped one in his mouth, and stopped short as her hand caught his sleeve.

They stared at each other for a long moment. Her eyes still had a too-wet glitter in them, but she smiled and patted his arm. "Thank *you.* I hope you don't mind my saying so, but I'm glad you'll be attending in the Festival. Not all offworlders would, in your position."

"It should be an interesting experience." He pointed at the door. "Excuse me, duty calls." He left the kitchen, dodging through the dining room swiftly, and hummed Au Clair de la Lune down the hall toward their room.

In the middle of the bathroom, Deanna sat in the sunken bathtub with her hair piled untidily on her head, eyes closed. Tendrils of steam rose around her in the chilly air; the pained expression she wore boded ill. He settled on the narrow edge of the tub, tore a bit of pastry, and tapped her chin. "Eat."

She opened her mouth. Feeding her bite by bite took a while, and she kept her eyes shut. Two pastries later, she tried looking at him, peering through her lashes. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"You're not sorry, you're pregnant, and don't worry about it. This is just a temporary relapse into hormonal behavior."

"You're being patient -- with Mother, too." She chewed mechanically on another bite. "But she's upset."

"Don't worry about her."

She looked down at herself, through the reflection of the bright sun from the skylight on the clear water. Apparently perfumed bath salts had been too much for her. "I'm getting fat," she moaned.

Tucking the remainder of the third pastry in her mouth, he touched her shoulder, ran a finger across her back and up her neck, then tried a squeeze. She leaned forward encouragingly, so he massaged her shoulders and upper arms.

"Madame?"

"I don't feel well." Nothing like restating the obvious.

"What will help?"

"I wish I knew. The water helps. I feel like I'm going to jump out of my own skin. I'm tired but I'm so restless. I should be doing something. . . ."

"You're not on the ship, Commander. Relax. Are you sure you're up to going today? Would you rather stay in and rest?"

She rolled her shoulders under his hands. "Maybe if you give me a more thorough massage. My skin itches. The bathing dries it out."

He helped her up unnecessarily, but she accepted it and actually smiled when he wrapped a towel around her. "You're very good to me. I don't think I tell you often enough how much I appreciate it."

"You don't have to, cygne. I can tell when you're happy."

She chose a bottle of lotion from her toiletries for him to use and arranged pillows, then settled on the bed face down. Under his slow strokes, less of a massage than a comforting rub, she fell asleep. Knowing she would wake up if he left the bed, he rested his hand on her back and lay on his side next to her, listening to her breathe.

The first quiet snore coincided with the distant sound of the ridiculous slide-whistle noise that made a pretense of being a doorbell. Only Lwaxana. Since Deanna had slipped deeper into slumber, he took the chance and got up, draping a blanket over her to keep her from a chill. The room felt cool, as the sun hadn't yet made it through the window.

Lwaxana's voice echoed down the hall, her eager tones indicating a visitor she liked, and he slipped out and closed the door behind him. Surprisingly, she met him halfway, fluttering toward him with outstretched hands. She'd changed into something flowing and less sheer, but more violently-colored, a swirling cacophony of reds and yellows. "I was just coming to get you -- there's someone I want you to meet."

"Me?" It took a moment, but he bobbed back to center. "Lwaxana, I just got her to sleep -- must you be so loud?"

She put both hands to her mouth. "Oh -- sorry. But do come meet my cousins, I've told them *so* much about you, and -- "

"Cousins."

Lwaxana propped her hands on her hips. "You're willing to go to the Festival, but you act as though meeting the family might be a fate worse than death? You can't have it both ways, Jean-Luc. They're here to meet you and see Deanna, and she's asleep -- they'll understand why, of course, but you're not -- "

"Fine, fine, yes, if it will get you farther away and quieter."

She blinked, looked at him bemusedly, and turned to lead him down the hall, waving her hands as if directing a marching band. At least she didn't say anything further.

The solarium reminded Jean-Luc of a jungle, with blooming vines draped over some of the furniture and climbing the walls and large-leaved trees clustered in corners. Attached to the back of the house and built with clear plasteel panels, the room felt humid and sun-baked already. Homn was opening some of the panels to let in a breeze as they joined two women seated at the table. Lwaxana introduced Plitty and Mwala to him with a happy, almost proud ring in her voice.

"This is Deanna's husband, Jean-Luc Picard, captain of the *Enterprise* -- he's also an old friend of mine." She brushed his arm and nearly put the other around him, but checked herself and changed the gesture into a shoulder-pat. "He's such a dear man. Deanna isn't feeling well, the poor thing, she's five months along now and mornings can be difficult, you know -- he was just helping her, doing the best he could anyway, it isn't as though there is much anyone *could* -- "

"A pleasure to meet you," he put in, smiling, hoping to staunch the flow before she drowned them all in words.

"We've heard so much about you, Captain," Mwala said, inclining her head. The dignity she showed was so completely unlike Lwaxana's usual frivolousness that he sat down instead of finding an excuse to flee. That seemed to send Lwaxana into delirium.

"Of course, I've told them all about our adventures -- Adnalon, the -- "

"I'll have ebi'lan tea, thank you," Mwala put in. "In fact, Plitty makes a wonderful ebi'lan -- won't you do that for us, Plitty dear? And I would very much like to see the latest souvenirs you've brought back, Lwaxana, you always find the most interesting items on your diplomatic endeavors."

"Of course -- Homn, show Plitty where you keep things. I'll be right back," Lwaxana sang, flitting away with the servant and the shorter, more sedate Plitty in tow.

"Redirection, Captain, is the secret," Mwala said softly. "Welcome to Betazed. And the family."

"Thank you. And thank you -- this is all new, I've only dealt with her as an ambassador before. I'm feeling a little awkward about it."

Mwala smiled serenely, reminding him of Deanna -- she did look a lot like her, he realized, though her dark hair wasn't curly or long. Something in the face, too, and the calm way she looked at him. "I can tell. How is Deanna?"

"Doing well, though she's feeling ill at the moment." Something brushed his ankle -- he looked down and saw only a branch of a nearby plant, in a large blue pot a meter from his chair. He shoved it away with his foot.

"How much has Deanna told you about her family?"

An interesting question, asked with a little too much urgency. "She mentioned you and your sister, and your children. She's told me about the few cousins left on her father's side of the family, back on Earth. It sounds as though Ian abandoned his culture for Betazed." Another touch on his ankle. He looked again, and saw the branch had somehow swayed back and curled around his leg. He shoved it with his foot again and stepped on it.

"Ian had his wife and children in mind when he did so. Though his parents came to visit their grandchildren several times before they died, there has not been much contact otherwise." Mwala's pleasant smile waned. She studied him intently, making him feel exposed. "Your family is from France, Lwaxana says."

She said it in a casual tone that, more than anything else so far, made him feel alienated. At least someone from Earth would know France was in Europe, and perhaps even a few words of the language. To Mwala, it was a label to put on him. From France. Like saying he was humanoid, or that he had eyes -- a fact, nothing more, and an abstract one from her perspective.

"I have no family -- my brother and nephew are both dead, in a freak accident. My sister-in-law and I keep in contact, but it's not the same."

"I'm sorry to hear that. My own husband died ten years ago. I still miss him, but having the children around helps. And grandchildren. My first granddaughter was born three years ago." Mwala gave him another searching look.

"You're thinking I'm older than you expected," he said. "I don't have any children."

Her eyes widened, and she covered her mouth and blushed. "Was it so obvious?"

"It wouldn't be the first time someone had taken note of the age difference. Lwaxana had a few words to say on the subject."

"My cousin can be quite outspoken. We Betazoids acknowledge what is, but not all of us make a point of voicing our observations. Just the opposite -- especially around non-telepaths."

Jean-Luc sighed and studied the table, the same type as was on the patio outside the kitchen, white and without blemish. "I've always found it interesting that Deanna can be so secretive -- the complete opposite of her mother. She's an excellent counselor for that reason."

Mwala pressed her lips together, then spoke cautiously and softly. "Lwaxana is outspoken, but she does not speak out of turn, Captain. She simply keeps her secrets hidden in different ways. Some find refuge in commotion and distraction, others in silence. There is one thing that Lwaxana has made no secret of, however, and that is the admiration she feels for you."

"Why do I find that difficult to believe?"

Mwala's eyes could smile as warmly as Deanna's. "You simply have to know how to listen. Ian used to say that while talking to Lwaxana, one had to look past the forest at the trees. It isn't so much the sum as the parts that one must pay attention to. Each time she comes back from a diplomatic mission, she has stories to tell. Her favorites have been her visits to your ship. Although at times I wonder if I'm reading her correctly, or if she's found a way to lie convincingly." She raised an eyebrow and looked past him; from the house came distant giddy exclamations from Lwaxana. "Did you actually battle a Ferengi to rescue her?"

"No," he blurted, then caught his composure. "I was only trying to save the Ferengi."

Mwala's eyes laughed. "I see."

Something grabbed his leg. He jumped, and Mwala leaned to look and laughed aloud. The vine had slipped itself out from under his foot, wrapped around his calf, and was in the process of coiling more of itself around his leg.

"What the *hell*?"

"It only wants to play, Captain. Be careful how you do that, Lwaxana likes her vines."

He unwound it and put it in the pot, where it lay coiled as he dropped it, as if sulking. "I can't imagine why anyone would want a plant for a pet."

"It likes you." As if that should placate him.

"It can just like me from a distance. I'm not used to vines that grab you."

"Here we are," Lwaxana cried, coming through the foliage. She held up a small black statue, of something Jean-Luc didn't recognize. On the verge of speaking, she glanced at Jean-Luc and Mwala, and stopped herself short. "You were talking about me, weren't you?"

"Mwala was telling me how you've exaggerated certain aspects of your visits to my ship," he said, cool and courteous.

She glared at him. "I don't exaggerate."

"I didn't battle the daimon -- I merely spoke to him. And I didn't rescue you, either. I cooperated with you, followed up on your idea."

Lwaxana stared at him a moment, then put the statue on the table. "I wonder what could be taking Plitty so long. Perhaps I should see." She hurried off toward the house.

Mwala pursed her lips and dropped her gaze to her lap. "I see my worries were unfounded. You seem to deal with her well enough."

Jean-Luc glanced over his shoulder at where Lwaxana had disappeared into the house. "But something's wrong. That wasn't the reaction I expected."

"What did you expect?"

"I don't know. But not avoidance."

When he turned around, he found Mwala gazing at him, her black eyes revealing nothing other than cautious contemplation. She turned her attention to the statue. "What do you suppose this is?" She picked it up and tested the weight of it in her palm.

More avoidance. Jean-Luc wished he could sense what went on around him. This was like being adrift in a tiny boat on a calm rolling ocean, with unknown things in the depths all around him, concealed by deceptive calm. He saw only the surface of what was there, he was positive. Lwaxana's subdued behavior seemed more ominous than promising, thanks to Mwala's reaction. Deanna had warned him -- but he was here for her sake, and for Yves and any siblings he might have in the future.

"It appears to be made of wood," he commented casually, noting the faint striations in the shining black contours of the statue.

\------------------------

All at once, Deanna woke from hazy dreams as if hearing a red alert klaxon. She sensed her mother's cousins at the same time as finding her husband, and recognized the emotional climate too well. Mother was excited and her cousins fascinated. Jean-Luc was a little frustrated, probably with Mother.

Deanna rose, still feeling somewhat ill but much improved, and put on a pink wraparound she'd brought to lounge around the house in. After quick attention to her makeup to hide any lingering weariness, she headed for the solarium, where certainly they would be sitting.

Jean-Luc stopped in mid-sentence upon realizing she approached -- he was getting good at sensing her, likely a byproduct of the work they'd put into creating a stronger, more intentional bond -- and Mwala and Plitty, both seated facing the house, looked up with wide smiles. Deanna exchanged the fond unspoken greeting of family with them and sat next to her husband.

"Your husband was just telling us about your new job," Mwala said. "I'm surprised. You always said you loved counseling, found it so rewarding -- though I suppose you're entitled to change your mind as much as anyone else."

"I still use my counseling abilities as first officer," she replied. "Not so much as a practitioner of clinical psychology, but it's amazing how similar the two positions can be sometimes."

"Did you really risk your life for him on Adnalon?" Plitty blurted in her breathy way. She always sounded as though she'd just run into the room, even though she never moved faster than a walk. Deanna looked at her mother, reading Jean-Luc's increasing frustration at the question.

"In addition to wanting to recover the diplomatic party, yes. What did Mother tell you?"

"How do you know I told them anything," her mother exclaimed quickly, gesturing at Jean-Luc. "He's been doing nothing but bragging about you since he arrived. Honestly, you would think you were the one running the ship!"

Jean-Luc merely shook his head and gave her a look that would have told her all, if she didn't already sense what was going on. Some sort of clash had happened. Good thing the cousins were accustomed to her mother's affect on people.

&lt;I think he's perfectly wonderful, dear. Your mother is jealous,&gt; Mwala's "voice" whispered into her consciousness. Ever mindful of her privacy, Mwala only barely intruded upon her thoughts. &lt;Not of him specifically, but you're fortunate. So rare to find a man like him. Such strength of character. And hajira -- your mother said nothing of it to us. Has this only recently developed, and she didn't know? I can't imagine why she wouldn't say something -- so bright, considering he's human.&gt;

&lt;I don't know why she hasn't said anything. It's been developing for almost two years now. She saw it before.&gt;

&lt;How like her not to acknowledge something when it's uncomfortable. Probably due to your marrying him after all her previous flirtations with him. She liked to brag about that, you know.&gt;

As her cousin spoke Deanna sensed how she felt. Though not as overt about it as Deltans, Betazoids admitted attractions freely. From the moment she and Jean-Luc left the gig at the port yesterday she'd sensed it all around them, the open admiration of Betazoids recognizing what her mother had sensed from the beginning. Jean-Luc had his fair share of sensuality, and as Mwala put it, strength of character -- telepaths admired discipline, and for a human, Jean-Luc showed incredible levels of it.

She should tell him how obvious it was, perhaps, but what good would it do? If she pointed out what was possible here on Betazed, he would only become extremely self-conscious for no good reason. Betazoids were full telepaths with empathic leanings, and telepaths would not reveal how easy it was to read a non-telepath. Maintaining the fiction that humans had complete privacy, in spite of the fact that their thoughts and emotions were so unguarded and at times so loud it was impossible not to hear them, was the best thing. Mother's teasing aside, even she ascribed to that unspoken rule. Jean-Luc had never been attracted to Lwaxana Troi and she'd known it. If she had honestly intended to pursue him, she would have stepped down from outrageous to something he might find more tolerable, but she found him too much fun to tease.

At the moment Lwaxana seemed interested in the extended greetings between her daughter and her cousins. Deanna answered a few more questions about life on the ship, and how they would handle having a baby aboard. Hoping her mother would continue her present near-normal behavior, she smiled at Mwala, nodded to Plitty, and began the ritual status-of-the-family questions. "How is Jaya?"

"Oh, she's doing so well," Plitty gasped happily. She launched into a lengthy dissertation on her daughter's current status as once-married-now-single-with-small-children. While the part of her mind Deanna had once used to keep track of the ramblings of patients followed Plitty's monologue, another part registered her mother's restlessness underneath her continued subdued demeanor. Was Mwala right? But jealousy -- she would have sensed that. Unless her mother was better at blocking her than she'd thought.

"Jaya has a new job, too," Mwala put in, breaking the pattern of Plitty's anecdotal evidence that her grandchildren were the best and brightest possible. &lt;He's marvelous. He absolutely worships you, Dena.&gt;

She referred to the look Jean-Luc was giving Deanna, the sudden segue of his thoughts into more private musings -- which caused a corresponding emotional shift. Bored by discussion of people he didn't know, he'd started thinking about other things. Deanna kept her eyes on Plitty and slid her hand to her husband's leg beneath the table. {Be careful, horny fish. Telepaths can pick that up without trying, as noisy as you're getting.}

Plitty's daughter's new job as a hostess in a major hotel in Dalena suddenly became the most interesting thing Jean-Luc had ever heard, if the shift of his attention were any indicator. Mwala almost grinned -- Deanna sensed it more than saw it in her face.

"Lwaxana said you had a Starfleet wedding already, but that you might have a Betazoid ceremony as well," Mwala put in at last.

"Oh, that would be wonderful!" Plitty forgot about the intricacies of her daughter's job, the idea was so appealing. "I'd love to see you married in a traditional Betazoid ceremony! We thought we had missed the opportunity when Lwaxana and the Millers -- " Mwala jogged her arm. "I mean, we thought you would never. . . . I'm sorry, dear."

"That's all right." It wouldn't be the first time that would come up, Deanna was certain. Not marrying Wyatt Miller had made her the talk of the Houses for a while. Even though it was years ago now, people still mentioned it. Of all the things to be famous for -- being genetically bonded to a human, who then left her in the lurch thanks to a mystical connection to some other woman. Now she was married to a different human, and not in a Betazoid ceremony, so there would be more talk.

"I find it interesting that you have chosen to come to Alipha," Plitty said, turning to Jean-Luc. "Will you also be taking the name?"

Deanna sat forward in her chair and stopped short of rising. "No, he won't. Jean-Luc, if we're going to make it in time for the beginning of the tour, we should leave soon. Unless you'd prefer to go tomorrow instead?"

"That would upset our other plans." He turned to the cousins, who now questioned with their eyes. "She agreed to show me the Fifth House before the Festival."

"She's right, it is quite a distance -- you'd best hurry," Lwaxana said, smiling. "And dear, if you would, I'd like to know how well the guide does -- I had to find a new one. The last one was embellishing things too much."

Deanna kissed her cousins' cheeks and led him from the solarium. In their room, Jean-Luc watched her change from the wrap into loose black pants and a long teal tunic, thinking hard enough that it circumvented any further lascivious thoughts he might have had. She looked up from slipping her feet into some sturdy shoes.

"Jean-Fish?"

"Troi is the family name? Not your father's?"

She averted her gaze, tapping her toe against the leg of the chair as if to settle the shoe on her foot. Hugging herself, she glanced out the window before turning to him again. "Yes. I knew you wouldn't want to change your name. Not even Mother would suggest it."

"Why do I get the feeling you weren't expected to marry at all?"

Deanna sat next to him on the end of the bed and crossed her arms over her abdomen, leaning against his chest. "I'm older than most House Betazoids are when they marry. And I was supposed to marry my bonded fiance. You could say I'm a bit of an oddity in the eyes of most."

"Including your cousins?" His arm went around her and he kissed the top of her head. "Cygne, don't be so sad. Water under the bridge, you know."

"Mother didn't really expect the Millers to insist, did I tell you that? She didn't want to force me into it. But a promise is a promise, even if I'd made it when I was very young."

"You would have gone through with it because you promised, then? I thought you were observing tradition."

"No. Wyatt wasn't so bad as all that. The Millers are nice people. Just put off by Mother's eccentricity."

He descended into a pensive, then distressed, mood. When he didn't pull out of it immediately she wrapped her arms around his waist. "What bothers you, Jean?"

"That I wasn't paying attention. Betazed has been a long-standing member of the Federation. I knew a few Betazoids at the Academy, I've worked with a few since, I've spent time here sightseeing -- I assumed too much. The Houses of Betazed are more than just an anachronism, and Plitty's question about taking the name just woke me up to that fact."

"If tradition obligated you to anything, I would have told you. It's not your tradition."

"But it's yours," he exclaimed angrily. "You know me well enough to know that I would want to understand."

She pulled away from him and covered her eyes with her hands. That was the problem with unresolved arguments, they came back with too much force when a reminder came along. She wished she hadn't suggested coming to the Festival all those months ago, when they were in France and she'd felt far from the person she had to be on Betazed. By the time she'd realized what might happen when he came in direct contact with the rest of her family, it was too late -- he had already learned the basics of what being a member of a House could mean to his children. And when it came to his children, there were certain compromises he was unwilling to make, even for her.

There were times she wished she could simply share everything with him, disregard the necessity for keeping the secrets of others, but she knew too well how violating others' privacy could end up. He would simply have to see for himself why she had changed her mind about wanting to come.

Hormones were ruining her self-control; tears escaped against her will. "Let's go see the house. You'll understand more when you see it."

Concern replaced anger rapidly. "You're sure you feel up to it?"

"I feel fine, it's just hormones making me overemotional."

They borrowed her mother's ground car, which Homn had brought around from the garage for them in anticipation of their trip. She answered Jean-Luc's questions about things they saw along the way, from Betazoid architecture to varieties of trees -- she was surprised at how much trivial information she remembered, and how much she didn't know. And, she observed wryly, this must be why he knew so much about so many things. Everywhere he went he questioned and made observations, even when not on a mission.

Everything changed, given enough time, but there were some things that never seemed to. The Fifth House was one of them. Still the same old imposing edifice in grey stone it always was, a blocky silhouette on the top of a hill, the front a masterpiece of old Betazoid architecture of ages past -- six sharply-pointed arches reminiscent of the cathedrals she'd seen in France. Jean-Luc went silent and pensive as they left the car at the foot of the hill. Walking up the long path through the gardens toward the entrance, he barely glanced at the well-kept topiaries and fountains her mother was so proud of, and hesitated at the top of the stairs just in the shadow of the pillar to their right, looking up at bird's nests lodged high in the eaves. She waited until he'd gotten his bearings before leading him inside. The doors were at least normal-sized, albeit angular, wider at the bottom than at the top. She had to take a moment to remember which direction to turn the long carved door handles. Six years since she'd been here -- since the last time they had hosted the Festival. How time flew -- it felt like yesterday.

"This isn't what I expected," he said, looking up at the precarious open staircase winding up to the second floor.

"It never is, when I bring someone to see it. I try to avoid it."

He touched her cheek, nudging her chin up to make her look at him. "What is it that makes you so despairing?"

"I've never liked what this place represents."

"To you, or in general?"

She hugged herself -- the entry always felt cold, no matter what time of year it was. "Let's go find the tour."

All the corridors on the first floor had the same pattern of tile -- vivid black-on-purple starbursts, eight points of various lengths, with flecks of silver. Jean-Luc studied the one at the foot of the stairs briefly before following her up. He stopped when he felt the sway of the first few steps.

"Is this safe? I didn't realize they were suspended so loosely." He studied the ceiling where the supports were fastened.

"They're all attached. It's not dangerous. They're inspected every so often. Can't run a tour through once a day on them otherwise."

The second floor had long halls with smooth lacquered wood flooring. She heard the tour guide's voice echoing down the halls. Oh. He was in *that* room. Setting aside the urge to just head for the rooms in the southwestern corner, she followed the sounds and stopped outside the open door.

The guide was in front of the broad window at the end of the room, telling the story of Hayava Troi. Deanna glanced at Jean-Luc and rolled her eyes, then led him inside. They crossed the room, careful not to allow their shoes to make noise on the bare wood floor, and attached themselves to the group of ten tourists. Most of them were human, Deanna noticed, with the exception of three Betazoids.

"When Hayava found out her husband had gone, she was heartbroken," the guide droned. "Hayava threw herself through this window." He waved a hand at the painted glass window. The four-meters-square pane was as accurate a replica as could be had of the original; painted flames against a deep blue background, with the Fifth House starburst over it. "She fell to her death on the pavement below."

"Wrong window," Deanna exclaimed, her words echoing faintly in the high-ceilinged room.

Everyone turned to look at her, the guide showing mild displeasure. "I'm sorry, Miss, but you are incorrect."

"No, you are. That's the window of the Flame of Rixx -- Hayava threw herself out the window of the Tree of Telistra." Deanna pointed at another window, along the north wall, with a flowering tree that looked more like a shrub painted on a yellow background. "She was heartbroken because of the death of her daughter and her husband. The Tree of Telistra was added when the daughter was born. The flame dated further back, to Hayava's grandmother, and the window had to be replaced when it was cracked in a windstorm."

"I'm sorry, Miss, but -- "

"And that window at the far end, with the Chalice of Ramitha painted on it, was put in when my great-grandmother Vemta was born," Deanna said. "Does my mother know you're rewriting family history?"

The guide stared at her. He had the atypical pale golden hair some Betazoids possessed, straight and long, hanging in a braid down his left shoulder as was presently popular. The dark purple uniform he wore reminded her of some pajamas she'd had once. "You are Dihanna -- "

"Deanna," she snapped. "Yes. Continue the tour, please."

She spent the rest of the tour being stared at off and on by the visitors, and enduring the barely-contained panic of the guide. He hadn't rewritten more than a handful of stories, and kept looking at her as if seeking reassurance, which she never gave. While the guide was describing the last room at the conclusion of the tour at the southeastern corner of the second floor, she left the group, Jean-Luc following her like a shadow. She went past the 'do not enter' placard down a side corridor to the door at the end on the left, tapped in a code on a keypad, and went inside.

"An apartment?" Jean-Luc asked, looking around at the modern furnishings, so bland after the garish and fantastic antiques they'd seen in some of the rooms.

"For the use of family. We no longer use the rest of the house for anything other than special occasions." She drew a finger across the pale green stone table and found it covered with a layer of dust. Glancing around at the bare shelves and the conical fire pit in the wall with its clean hearth, she bypassed the open kitchen and went down the hall to the bedroom that had been hers.

When Jean-Luc came in, he stared at the bed, the pale wood flooring, the wide window, and felt shock. She paid little attention to him, wrapped up in remembering this place. The linens had been stripped from the mattress and put in storage, of course. She went to the window and undid the latch, swinging the pane in and pushing aside the dusty curtains. Bird song and a cool breeze came in.

"You recreated this on the holodeck," he murmured at last, coming to stand beside her and laying a hand in the small of her back. "After we confronted Shelby, and then you confronted me -- why this room?"

"This was my bedroom. My sanctuary. We stayed here for a while -- we moved in when I was twelve. I went to school in Jenila. This was where I decided to pursue Starfleet." Deanna stared unseeingly at the gardens outside. "Mother taught me about the House and told me the stories, about my ancestors and their lives. The things they did and the children they had. All the things in this house have stories attached to them, passed down through so many generations of women."

"But hardly anything about the men."

"You noticed that?" She sighed, thinking about the guide and his half-truthful stories. "You say humanity has come a long way from the inequalities and unjust stereotyping of previous generations, yet your father -- "

"But even Father was only traditional to a point -- he may have insisted on treating Maman like a lady, but he never implied she was incapable or inferior." A flicker of wry amusement. "In fact, he tended to put her on a pedestal."

"The Houses are an anachronism. Modern Betazoid culture accepts men and women as equals, accepts other races as equals -- but within the Houses we preserve history."

"Even matriarchy?"

"Mother brags that she contributed to the discontinuation of ridiculously-elaborate hairstyles -- it isn't an idle brag. Betazoids in the House lineage are hopelessly traditional. We are rebels, Mother and I. Trapped between respecting our heritage and wanting to live life as we wish."

He stepped closer and put his arms around her from behind. "Are you afraid that your heritage will be lost completely, and that it will be your fault?"

She closed her eyes. The breeze brought with it the unique smells of blooming Betazoid flora, drifting up from the gardens. "Mother was afraid of it. She married who she pleased anyway, because she loved him. Her mother disliked the choice but accepted it because she loved her daughter."

"And you're doing the same."

Deanna closed the window and latched it, then went to sit on the bare mattress. As always, Jean-Luc let go, never holding her against her will. Once more he indulged deep musings and came to stand over her a moment, then sat and waited for her to finish her thinking.

"I have the life I want," she said at last. "I can teach my children, just as Mother taught me."

"Would you have come back to Betazed and had children on your own, if not for me?"

She turned to study his face -- his somewhat-melancholy musing continued unchanged. "I would have returned, but I don't know about children."

"Then you weren't thinking about it?"

Deanna put her hands on her belly. Tears began again, to her dismay. "I don't want to think about what I would have done without you. Please don't remind me."

"Oh, chere, don't cry. I'm sorry. Something your mother said earlier -- I should know better, you're too moody for -- "

"My mother told you I was going to come home and have children?" she blurted. "My mother said that to you?"

"Dee -- "

"She had no right! It wasn't her place to say anything!" Deanna leaped up and paced. "She shouldn't have been discussing that with you. What was she thinking?"

"She thought I already knew," Jean-Luc said, slightly reproachful. At whom was the question -- himself, her, or her mother. "I thought she must be wrong, after further consideration. But she wasn't, was she? You were planning on doing that, when I found you in the lounge. Were you that concerned about providing an heir for the House?"

"Isn't that a moot point?"

"I suppose. Fortunate that I caught you before you went through with it."

She turned around, leaned against the wall, and looked at him sitting on the edge of the bed smiling at her. Difficult to tell if he were setting aside the dire musings and cheering himself up just for her sake, but it was very likely. "Yes, I suppose it is fortunate."

He stood and feigned a contemplative stance, taking a few wandering steps. They moved slowly toward one another. She watched his face -- eyes closed, but he obviously knew exactly where she was, thanks to hajira. His hands closed on her arms as he kissed her forehead lightly.

"You have to suppose?" he mumbled.

"No. I know I'm fortunate. I love you, Jean-Luc. Maybe we should leave, go somewhere other than the Festival -- "

"If I had to spend all that time at the chateau -- "

"Oh, all right, Counselor Picard, we'll stay. But I was only thinking of you. Mwala and Plitty were only the beginning, and much more pleasant than what's to come."

"Perhaps, but it's necessary. Now that the official tour is over, do I get the personal one? And what's Dihanna?"

She led him toward the exit. "Dihanna is a Betazoid sound-alike I used to hear all the time. I hate it."

"It doesn't sound so bad to me."

Locking the door behind them, she glanced at him as she took his hand. "Imagine yourself at six years old and having someone you don't know call you Jean. And would you tolerate anyone but me calling you that now?"

"Absolutely not."

"Didn't think so. I know what," she said, smiling and remembering, "I'll show you my treehouse."

\------------------------

Jean-Luc followed his moody bird through the gardens and wished he could understand. She'd tried to talk him out of coming to Betazed -- pointed out that she hadn't been a first officer when she'd originally suggested it, that she wanted to stay with the ship. None of this melancholy had presented itself then. Too late to demand explanations of why she hadn't listed all her reasons; there was no sense in upsetting her further.

She led him down a winding paved path to a large tree -- far larger than the oak in which he'd built his treehouse in France. Deanna put a hand on her hip, the other on her forehead, and looked up into the shaded underside of the canopy of pale green leaves high overhead.

"I think this tree grew too much in the last twenty years," she said at last. "There's no way we could climb up there." She pointed -- a bit of board was barely visible high in the thinnest of the branches.

"Is it that much larger than it was?"

"Very much so. It was about the same size as your oak, from what I remember."

"Well, since I wouldn't want you climbing around in a tree anyway -- "

"Deanna?" The querulous call startled both of them. Deanna looked at him, then in the direction of the voice -- smiling, she jogged up the path to meet an elderly man. Jean-Luc was surprised to see her race into his arms without hesitation and kiss his pale wrinkled cheek. He recognized the pause of telepathic communication -- Deanna had always made a point of forcing her mother to communicate verbally on the ship, but here on Betazed she seemed more open to telepathic exchanges. He was certain she'd had a silent conversation or two while they were with Mwala and Plitty.

The man looked at Jean-Luc and came down the path, Deanna on his arm. "Captain Picard, a pleasure to meet you."

"This is Baymei Tay," Deanna added. "He's been the gardener here since I was small. He helped me build my treehouse, in fact."

"I was considerably younger then," Baymei said. "Dena tells me you are her commanding officer and her husband. A pleasure to meet you, sir. I remind you of someone?"

It still caught him off guard -- he'd gotten used to having Deanna read him easily, but when another Betazoid did it he felt a moment of disorientation. "One of my oldest friends is a gardener. You've been with the family that long? Do you care for all this yourself? It seems a bit much for one man."

"It is. My son helps me." Baymei smiled at Deanna. "Bomay will be disappointed, you know, Dena. He's always fancied you would come home and -- what is this face you give me?"

She was struggling not to cry again, covering her mouth with a hand. "I'm sorry. I'm not feeling so well. It's only hormones and mood swings -- I'm five months pregnant." Automatically her eyes dropped to Yves, concealed by the loose teal tunic until she ran a hand down her abdomen.

Baymei smiled fondly. "I could tell, even if your mother hadn't updated me on your progress each week. He's nearly his own entity already. Another little one to teach gardening to -- maybe he'll be better at it than his mother?"

"Just about anyone would be." Deanna smiled through the vestiges of tears, wiping her cheek on her sleeve. "Do you know the tour guide?"

"That fellow -- I warned your mother about him. Lazy. Forgets too much." Gesturing up the walk, Baymei started toward the house. "Come with me, we'll get you something to drink, a place to sit -- you are looking tired, Little One."

He led them a winding path to another part of the grounds. The gardener lived in a tiny house in the shadow of the House, in a small grove of trees. He settled Deanna in a large soft chair in a corner of his shaded porch and brought two more chairs from inside. All three chairs looked just like the one in their bedroom at Lwaxana's house -- it must be a popular style. Another trip and he had them drinking some of the cold ebi'lan that was so popular on Betazed. They discussed gardening, the arboretums aboard the ship, and the differences between Terran and Betazoid vegetation. Jean-Luc realized only as a gentle snore interrupted them that Deanna wasn't just being quiet. He exchanged glances with Baymei, who raised bushy white brows at the sight of Deanna slumping over the cup she held in both hands in her lap.

"Asleep that way, she looks as she did when she was little," the old gardener said softly. "She is distressed. That and the baby make her tired, no doubt. All is well with you on your ship?"

"Yes." Jean-Luc hesitated, about to question, and Baymei smiled.

"It is being here, then. This was a difficult place for her to live. You are very curious -- she hasn't said so much to you?"

"No. It seems to make her moody. Did you know her father?"

"I have been here since before Ian married Lwaxana. He was a proud man and a fine officer. You remind me of him, in your demeanor."

The bottom of the glass felt cold against his leg. Jean-Luc switched the glass to his other hand and watched Deanna sleeping. "She doesn't remember him very well."

"She was young. His loss had a great impact on her because Lwaxana grieved too long. Ian would not have wanted her to, especially when it had such a lasting effect on their daughter -- Dena was too serious as a child. Little girls should be sunshine and happiness." Baymei ran a finger along his hooked nose. "But perhaps she would have been serious nevertheless. Who is to say? I still visit Lwaxana's home once a month to see to her own garden there, so I see Dena each time she returns home. Dena has been happy most of those times. Yet there have been a few times when I found her sitting alone looking at the sky thinking about far away things, being sad."

The chair swayed slightly as he shifted his weight. Jean-Luc sipped the ebi'lan and studied his sleeping wife again.

"It makes you sad thinking about it. But you have given her a child. No doubt you are very happy together. Hajira would not be expected, in your situation -- that it exists is proof that she has devoted herself to you." Baymei's eyes widened. "Why does this upset you?"

"Is it so easy to tell how I feel? Hajira is that obvious?"

"Yes, though I suspect it would be easy to tell how you feel even if you did not have hajira. It's in the way you look at her, too."

Jean-Luc met the gardener's dark eyes. "I don't understand what hajira means. Every time I think I do, someone says something that makes me wonder again."

"It means what you want it to mean." Baymei's cryptic smile reminded him of Guinan. "It is different for you. Betazoids show their feelings in other ways."

"How do you mean?"

"Hajira looks different with a human. Our body language is different, our mental output feels different, our gestures have different context. I discussed it once with Ian, over ebi'lan." He held up the cup. "Ian wanted to understand what Lwaxana had difficulty explaining and thought another perspective would help. The touch of the back of the neck, for example -- long ago we believed the soul resided there, at the base of the skull. To touch that spot is an intimacy only allowed those we trust completely. It can be many things depending on the context, an expression of devotion, a wish, an offer, a surrender. . . . I see you know of this."

Jean-Luc nodded, speechless, thinking of all the times Deanna had done that to him. It had seemed intimate but he hadn't realized it had any meaning beyond that.

Baymei smiled and stood up with the care of the old. "Come inside and I'll refill your drink. There is something I think you would like to see."

The interior of the small house was crowded with furniture and mementos, the walls covered with artwork and two- and three-dimensional images of people. Baymei took Jean-Luc's cup and indicated a large picture in the center of the wall to their right, then left his guest to examine it.

Deanna resembled her father more in bearing than in any physical way. Ian Troi stood next to his wife, smiling, and the much younger Lwaxana was beautiful -- her eyes were happy and her smile contented. In one arm she held a small bundle that could only be a baby, and on her left stood a girl who must have been Kestra. Lwaxana couldn't have known this was here. She must see the gardener only on her terms, at her house.

Jean-Luc's eyes wandered to the other pictures on the wall around it. Some were of the Troi family; a few seemed to be of Deanna and a boy, probably Baymei's son, playing in the gardens. One caught his attention more than the others. He took it down to get a closer look. A teenaged girl stood alone against a hedge, unmistakably Deanna, curly hair and huge dark eyes the most obvious identifiers. She wore a dark green dress and held her hands before her in a posture that suggested insecurity and defensiveness. The expression on her face as she looked into the imager was one of utter despair and loneliness. It begged the question of why that image hung on the wall at all.

That loneliness struck a chord deep inside. Spinning memories through his mind, he tried to ascertain exactly why it touched him so -- then he remembered. He'd seen her eyes like that before. She'd been helping him recover from the Borg, and during a particularly-difficult session in which words had failed him, she had come around her desk, sat in that second chair next to him, and taken his hand. When he looked up at her finally he'd realized she was resorting to simply sharing the misery with him. He'd found words, just to do away with the look on her face.

And then there had been that evening in the lounge, when he'd found her staring at the stars and taken her for a walk. She'd worn the look then, too. Only that time it had been her own loneliness. Both times, that look had been because of him.

"Captain," Baymei said softly. "Is something wrong?"

Jean-Luc turned, holding out the picture. "What happened?"

He realized belatedly that he'd issued an order, as if the gardener were one of his subordinates. But the old man didn't flinch -- he took the picture and studied it a moment, then gave it back.

"She was lonely."

"You could call the Fifth House a shack, if you call this lonely. What happened?"

Baymei went back to the kitchen and returned with the two cups, passing one to Jean-Luc. "That was taken on her birthday. There was a party, here at the House on the lawn. Her schoolmates came mostly because it was at the Fifth House -- she didn't know any of them well. She came to see me to get away from the others and asked me to take the picture."

"Where was her mother?"

Baymei's eyes said he understood the frustration Jean-Luc felt. "Being as happy as she could be, entertaining the parents. It would have been her twentieth wedding anniversary, if Ian had lived. Deanna was born on their anniversary. Two weeks before her due date -- Ian made Lwaxana laugh so hard she went into labor. Or so I'm told." He looked at the picture Jean-Luc held, took it from him, returned it to its spot, and pointed at another. "She wasn't always sad."

The picture showed Deanna looking down from a tree house, her hair wild in the wind. The angle from which it had been taken cast her face half in shadow, and the visible half of her expression showed a subdued smile and an early version of the familiar demeanor of Deanna Troi. Too adult, for a girl that age.

"She was only a child," Jean-Luc mumbled. He searched the other pictures for one of her at the same age or older that showed her being carefree and happy. "I refuse to believe that Lwaxana, as frivolous as she is -- "

He felt the flicker of emotion not his own and stopped himself short. Deanna was awakening and questioning. Closing his eyes, he quickly imagined Yves, as he would be. Their trip to Telix and the adventure that had nearly ended in disaster had given them an unexpected preview of their son. Remembering the brightness of his son's eyes smiling at him was enough to dispel the anger he'd been working toward.

"Very good, Captain," Baymei whispered. "You have excellent self-control. I hope you do not judge Lwaxana too harshly. The pain of losing hajira is excruciating and she wasn't prepared for it."

"I understand the pain of loss -- what I don't understand is clinging to it for so many years." He looked at the gardener again. "She had a child. She should have -- "

"It is easy to judge when you do not have first-hand knowledge of the situation." Baymei's eyes traveled to the door. A scuff of a shoe, and Deanna appeared, rubbing her eyes.

"What's going on?"

"We were talking about you, of course," Jean-Luc said. "You obviously needed another nap. Perhaps I should take you home."

"I will be visiting your mother's house in a few days, so we will have another chance to visit," Baymei added. "You should rest, Dena, and take care of your little one."

Jean-Luc thanked the old man and walked up the hill with Deanna, taking her arm. Her melancholy returned once they left Baymei, and his own mood wanted to slide down to sadness as well -- the tormented eyes of a younger Deanna haunted him. She led the way around the house instead of through it.

Once in the insulated quiet of the ground car and on their way, the course fed into the computer, they sat in silence for a while, each looking out a window. The small lot had been empty -- the guide and all the tourists long gone. The winding road from the Fifth House had no other traffic on it.

He turned to look at her finally, watching her watch scenery, then reached across, leaning until he could touch her. At the first brush of a fingertip on her throat she closed her eyes; when he caressed the back of her neck, she shuddered. Then she slid to the middle of the seat and pulled her feet up, putting her head in his lap.

While touching her face gently, he closed his eyes and meditated. Slipping into the deeper trance took only moments. The last sensation he remembered was of her hair against his palm, and the soft skin of her cheek. They spun together for a while in silence and basked in the closeness, but still, those haunted eyes lingered in his memory.

{Cygne, why were you so sad?}

She cried -- he focused on the heart fire and on soothing her. If she wanted to talk she would. Once soothed, she drifted in the warmth, until she brought them out of their private inner world with a jolt.

He realized the car had stopped and opened his eyes. They were in front of Lwaxana's house -- they'd ridden in heart fire for the past hour, losing track of time. Deanna sat up and sidled close, putting her arms around him and her head on his shoulder.

"Thank you," she murmured. "I'm sorry I was so out of it. Going there makes me remember things I'd rather forget."

"You know where you can find a willing listener if you need to talk."

She kissed his cheek. "Yes, I know, and I appreciate that. We're going to change and go to dinner. Just us."

"You mean like a date?"

Running her fingers through her hair, she sat back and smiled coquettishly. "Just like a date. Remember what a date is?"

"Oh." He sighed. "Bad fish. I've been forgetful again, haven't I?"

"That's all right. So has the bird. Let's go in, before Mother comes out to see what we're up to in the front seat of her car."

\------------------------

Returning from the restroom, Deanna lingered in the foyer and watched couples and groups going to and fro, curious to see if there might be anyone she knew. Though the Skydome was popular this wasn't a very busy evening; nearly half the smaller tables were empty. Too late in the season, perhaps. It was nearly winter, or as wintery as it got on Betazed.

The restaurant had a clear ceiling, the faint stars and bright moons visible overhead, and since it was such a beautiful night the staff had opened windows all around to let the breeze blow through. The lighting consisted of floor-level glowstrips marking the walkways between tables and glowing candles in pale green jars on the tables, the latter just bright enough to cast a soft glow on the faces of each table's occupants. It gave the Betazoid ladies' spangled dresses the best advantage; in this environment even the most outrageous of Lwaxana's dresses would have seemed less gaudy.

Deanna had chosen a shimmering silver sheath, sleeveless and held up by strands of what appeared to be tinsel. The front and back hemlines were the same -- a shallow V that showed shoulder blades and cleavage, but modestly covered her belly and all other points south. It was obvious she was pregnant, but she still sensed the attention of others as she made her way slowly around the restaurant, minding the markers on the glowstrips.

Their table for two was in a corner, in front of a wide bank of windows overlooking the lake. She had chosen the Skydome for the ambiance, and for the fact that it was far enough away from the space port that Starfleet officers on leave wouldn't be likely to find it. As she walked the meandering path between the tables, she saw that a tall woman had stopped to talk to Jean-Luc. From her posture and the tenor of her emotions, she was intent on her goal -- she leaned forward, and if the front of her white dress dipped half as low as the back, Jean-Luc knew too much about the blond's assets already.

Deanna hesitated and observed for a moment, assessing what she should do next. She knew that woman. Chandra's husband was nowhere to be seen. Judging from her interest in Jean-Luc, he wasn't an issue, regardless of the details. She wished she could speak telepathically to someone other than family -- it would have been handy right then, to warn Chandra away.

Finally, sensing Jean-Luc was about to end the conversation with a flat refusal, Deanna went forward. "Chandra?" she said, pitching her voice carefully. As most of the customers were telepaths, the dining area was almost eerily quiet.

Her friend spun so quickly one of her stiff curls sprang loose and coiled down the side of her face. "Deanna!" Chandra flung her arms out to hug her and pulled away immediately when Yves came between them. "Oh -- almost six months, right?"

"I wasn't expecting to see you for another day. What a coincidence -- you look wonderful. Where is Halsan?"

In the dimness, with her back turned to the candle on the table, Chandra's expression wasn't really discernible. Her emotional undercurrents told the whole story, though. "He left last week."

"I'm sorry." Deanna squeezed her hand briefly. After a respectful moment of empathic grieving, she inclined her head toward Jean-Luc, who waited with arms crossed on the table and head bowed. "Who are you talking to here?"

"Oh -- " Chandra backed a step, half-turning, glancing at Jean-Luc. "I didn't catch his name. I'm sorry to have bothered you, sir. Excuse me." She turned her whole attention back to Deanna. "So where is this husband of yours?"

Deanna raised an eyebrow and grinned. "Suffering death by embarrassment, thanks to some shameless woman with more cleavage than sense. I should know by now, leaving him alone in a public place is dangerous."

Chandra gaped for a full minute before covering her face with her hands. "Oh. Dena, I'm *so* sorry!"

"It's his own fault for being such a handsome, charming -- "

"Dee, honestly," Jean-Luc cut in quietly. No curmudgeon in his tone -- he was embarrassed, but flattered and reassured enough by her identifying Chandra as someone who could laugh with them about it.

Deanna stepped closer and let her hand drift to the back of his neck, sharing her silent laughter with him. "It's only true, cher."

"Hajira," Chandra whispered wonderingly.

"Are you here with someone?" Deanna asked more to divert the conversation than anything else.

"Yes. Some friends. Which I'll go back to, and leave you be -- I'll see you tomorrow, when I was supposed to meet you, and hopefully suffer selective amnesia. I'm sorry, Captain."

"No harm done." Jean-Luc glanced at Deanna as if making sure. Chandra smiled and left, her dress glimmering as she walked.

"Flirting with my friends. I can't take you anywhere, can I?" Deanna smiled down at him fondly, playing with his hair. "How many other women did you manage to flirt with while I was off trying to convince your son to stop dancing on my bladder?"

"She interrupted me, actually. I was thinking of you."

Which explained why he'd caught Chandra's attention. That little vibe of a human who wasn't shielding his thoughts must have been like a tap on the shoulder as she walked by, and direct attention resulted in a more complete picture of an attractive, disciplined, dignified man sitting alone in a restaurant. Their dinner dishes had been taken away; there wasn't a trace of a companion, only two cups that could have both been his, since the waiters brought new ones each time. Again, Deanna considered telling him how noticeable he was, and that it had little to do with externals. Though he did look too good in the suit he wore. It resembled the one he'd worn for their wedding, but dark blue instead of black.

She sat again, her hand joining his across the table once more. The way he kept looking at her curled her toes. Hajira became obvious when they were together, and while people would be fascinated by the rare phenomena, they wouldn't approach either of them.

He picked up his cup and studied whatever was left of his after-dinner coffee. {Does everyone call you Dena here?}

{No. Just close friends. I'm sorry about Chandra. But you are distracting, I'm afraid.} Extending her right foot, she slipped a toe up his pant leg.

{You seem to be feeling better than you did this morning.}

{I am. Would you like dessert?}

His eyes rose from his cup and lingered on her face. Pressing her fingers into his palm with his thumb, he put down his coffee. The corner of his mouth twitched into a sly half-smile. {I thought you were dessert.}

Deanna gazed into his eyes, feeling the tickle of Yves doing a flip and a familiar heat starting lower in her belly. A blush of heart fire washed over her, but an indefinite time later the long inarticulate conversation of hajira was interrupted by flickerings of shock and recognition, and as attached as they'd let themselves become, he detected it at the same time.

She looked at their hands, joined on the white table cloth next to the glowing jar candle, and the bands on their fingers -- that human tradition of wearing rings. Betazoids didn't wear jewelry as symbols of personal attachments. She suddenly felt foreign, here in the middle of a restaurant full of Betazoids -- foreign in a way she hadn't felt in years. Meeting Jean-Luc's gaze again, she saw awareness in his eyes; he knew her mood had changed, and questioned.

Deanna sat up as if merely stretching and glanced over her shoulder casually. The silhouette of a woman, in one of those hideous high-necked dresses that were popular among the House ladies, stood not fifteen paces away between two tables. Walima. And, from the glimmer of her skirt in the glow of the footlights, she wore dark purple. She didn't have the right to wear anything that hinted at a connection to the Fifth House -- how dare she show up in public wearing that?

Turning back to her husband, Deanna smiled and leaned forward slowly. He met her halfway across the small table, expecting a murmured confidence or a kiss on the cheek, a little surprised when she tipped her head and tasted his mouth instead. A glancing blow more than a real kiss, but he recovered from shock and reconnected. She usually saved anything more intimate than a touch of the hand for more private environments out of respect for his preferences. That he humored her by returning the kiss surprised her.

More people were watching them than she'd thought. A ripple of amusement and appreciation came from several directions. Parting, she brushed her lips along his cheek and settled nose to nose with him, the heat of the candle rising against her chin.

{Madame knows how to get my attention. Too bad there's no dance floor here.}

"You don't like to dance," she murmured.

{No. But it's a socially-acceptable way to fondle you in public.}

She closed her eyes and barely squelched a giggle. He didn't fondle her in public, regardless of whether they danced or not -- this was a distraction. It was working, if only because he loved her enough to resort to it in the name of cheering her up. {Would you settle for a walk around the lake?}

They rose as one, still hand in hand, and as they made their way toward the exit in the semi-darkness she noticed Walima had gone. But as they stepped into the coolness outside, Deanna saw her standing near a ground car parked six cars away, with Mwala and Plitty. Jean-Luc recognized the two shorter women and turned to look at Deanna. She led him down the street away from the trio.

{The third person is their older sister, Walima.}

{I saw her inside. Was she the one you were upset about?}

Deanna walked in miserable silence, echoes of arguments between Walima and her mother ringing in her ears, even after all the time that had passed. She hesitated at the back of the Skydome, glancing down each of two paths that would take them one way or the other around the lake.

She felt the trepidation from Jean-Luc before she sensed that they had been followed. Before she could turn around, he smoothed the few curls she had left along the back of her neck when she put her hair up. His gentle affection washed away her rising anger. She looked at his face, ignoring the woman standing just out of arm's reach. Though his smile didn't reach his eyes, the affection and concern did.

His fingers warm in her hand, she strolled down the path branching right, along the back of the restaurant. It wandered among some reeds, over mud full of creaking and groaning insects that sounded somewhat like Terran frogs, and through a small grove of trees into an open grassy area with two benches facing each other across the path. Jean-Luc pulled her to a halt under a string of lamps that had been hung from one tree to another over the benches.

"Why does she make you so angry?"

"I'm fine, Jean-Fish. She's nothing," Deanna replied calmly. "We won't even see her at the Festival. She and my mother haven't spoken in years."

"If it's nothing, why have you closed me out completely, and why is your hand shaking?"

He let go when she moved away from him. The heels of her shoes clicked on the pavement, then sunk in the turf as she moved away from the path. He followed her to the water's edge, but only to be within easy reach -- he crossed his arms and let her be. Deanna stared down at the reflection of a moon on the rippling black waters of the lake.

After a long pause, he took a step closer. "I've been trying to imagine what could have happened at the Fifth House that might have turned you into the lonely little girl Baymei has in his pictures, and why he would hang them on the wall for all to see. Does Walima have something to do with that?"

Swallowing a sob, Deanna closed her eyes, blocking out the night and the serenity of the lake. "I asked him to hang those pictures. They are the truth. Mother, in her usual pattern of avoidance, destroyed all the ones she had from that time period."

"And in your usual pattern of avoidance, you refuse to talk about it. If I had known coming here would upset you so much I would have been less interested in coming. Would you like to leave?"

"That wouldn't be fair to Mother. She's the only reason I ever come home."

Another footfall in the grass. His hand closed around hers, soft and warm, but not insistent. "Come back over here. Sit with me for a while."

She went with him. The stone bench was cold through her thin dress; he noticed her squirm and held out an arm, gesturing for her to come closer, pulling her against him for warmth. Something crinkled under her hand when she settled against his chest. He reached around with the arm in which he held her to pull a picture from the inside pocket of his jacket.

"I found this in the album your mother keeps in the library," he said, holding it out for her to see. "She said I could have it. I wanted to think of you this way instead of the girl in Baymei's pictures. This is how your father wanted you to stay, I'm sure."

It was a picture of her at six, curled up in a chair at the Fifth House. Wearing the simple white dress for her first Festival, but Jean-Luc couldn't know that unless her mother had told him, and she wasn't likely to have done so. Deanna had played peekaboo with her father when he tried to take the picture, using a large brocaded cushion to hide behind, and Daddy had snapped the picture as she dropped it to stick out her tongue at him. He'd caught her just as her tongue was disappearing back into her mouth and a big grin made its appearance.

"Mother let you have this?"

"She also gave me this." He took out a piece of folded paper and opened it. From the creases it had been that way for a long time. She stared at it while the wind sighed in the leaves and distant laughter echoed across the lake to them.

"My pony," she whispered at last. "I wanted a pony when I was little. I used to draw them all the time and put up the pictures on the walls of my room. I didn't know they didn't come in blue."

He chuckled at that, and she pressed her cheek into the folds of his jacket to feel the vibration of his laughter in her ear. "I'll bet you can't guess what I used to draw."

"Starships, of course. Probably accurate ones."

"Maybe as I got older. My earlier efforts tended to be a nice shiny silver, until I decided I preferred red. I seemed to have the idea I could have whatever color I wanted."

"I'll call Geordi in the morning and tell him to put the cadets in EVA suits and give them paintbrushes."

"You needn't go that far." The soft ripple of his amusement soothed her. "I'll just have Natalia paint the gig with her toothbrush. And I'll even have her make it blue, just for you."

They sat in silence, listening to insects chirping and creaking. Her eyes drifted shut; in the comfort of his arms, she could relax. Thoughts of the blue pony brought back other memories. Nuzzling closer with the scent and warmth of him to soothe her, she tried to explain.

"I loved her," she said distantly. "When Daddy died she was there for us. She moved in with us for a while. Mother was so distraught, and I was so afraid -- Walima would sing to me, hold me for hours, comforting me. She helped Mother with family business -- the House, and teaching me what I should know. She was like a sister to Mother, and an aunt to me. Mwala lived too far and had her own children, and Plitty was busy with her own family and her career. Walima suggested we move into the House when I was twelve so I would learn about our family history. I didn't have that many friends -- I was new, and it's so far out that Mother's servant had to drive me to and from school. Walima came to see us every month for a while. When I was fourteen, I reached full ascension -- I became an empath. I didn't recognize it because it was so gradual and it came earlier than expected. Telepaths shield themselves and I was so slow to develop -- I finally began to recognize Mother's emotions as distinct from my own. Walima's visits were further apart. When she came out to see us after a three month absence, suddenly I could sense her emotions. They weren't what I expected."

He waited. It made her smile -- so far from the brusqueness of Captain Picard as she used to know him. When it came to those he loved, he could be infinitely patient, if he felt it was necessary. Though he'd been curious and concerned since their arrival over her varying moods, he'd waited for her to talk about it, confident that if she needed to, she would come to him. At least he no longer panicked that she might miscarry if she became overemotional. Halfway through the pregnancy the risk became minimal.

"She pitied me," Deanna continued quietly. "It took a while to decipher the entirety of it -- while she spoke to Mother I paid attention, and I began to ask questions myself. I guessed that she pitied me because she didn't believe I would ever have any Betazoid abilities, and she resented that Mother married my father. She disliked that Mother had me bonded to Wyatt. Because she and Mother are telepaths, because they have the discipline and the training, she was able to shield her true thoughts from Mother, but she couldn't shield all her emotions from me, nor did she know she had to. True telepaths, Betazoids at least, respect each other's privacy. I confronted her."

"I can imagine your mother's reaction must have been. . . spectacular."

"I was young, and new to empathy. I reacted very poorly -- mostly out of my own heartbreak and guilt. I loved Daddy, and Walima became the support we needed to get through the grief of losing him. I felt like a traitor knowing Walima had been so against his marrying into the House. In the end, Mother disowned her from the House. She can do that. And after that Walima never spoke to either of us again. She's been angry ever since."

"She tried to approach you just now. Was she still angry?"

Deanna thought about it. "I don't know," she admitted at last. "I was angry. It tends to confuse what I sense from others, you know."

"If you could make amends with her, would you?"

"Mother -- "

"This isn't about your mother, not yet -- Mwala and Plitty obviously don't find it difficult to spend time with both sides, or if they do, they don't allow it to stop them. Right, Counselor?"

She muffled a guffaw in his jacket. "You keep groaning about marrying your former counselor -- it's just as bad marrying a former long-term patient. The patients with analytical tendencies pick up too much and turn it on you."

"I'm having difficulty believing you would have this problem in the first place -- why has it persisted for so long?"

"It's unethical to counsel family, not to mention they have no respect for you -- over-familiarity does that. Your elders always know better regardless of how many degrees you have. And you don't know how stubborn Walima is. My mother is bad, Walima is worse. I've tried to call. Walima wouldn't talk to me." The last attempt had been over a decade ago, but no reason to tell him that. Trying for years prior to that made it pretty clear what her chances were of re-establishing that old tie.

"If it's so unethical to counsel family, what was all that you put me through at the chateau?"

"Old habits are hard to break, Jean-Fish, and you're still my favorite patient. And I have a vested interest in your mental health. I was just being there for you as much as I could be." Cheek to his shoulder, she looked at the picture of her and the childish drawing of her blue pony. With the light from the lanterns overhead directly on the paper, she could see something showing through from the back, and turned it over. "What is that?"

"Your mother said it was written about the same time the picture was taken, which was why the drawing was folded up and tucked in with the picture."

She read it slowly. Jean-Luc's arm tightened around her -- apparently her reaction was that obvious to him.

*It can get so cold for a little girl  
In the dark of night in a mixed up world  
There's not much room in a place like this  
For the innocent that the angels kissed

They tell you lies and take you down  
They're just so lost around this town  
But I see you just like a star  
Whose little light fractures the dark  
But in my eyes you shine so bright

You'll find your true reflection  
When you look at me  
So keep my words hide them in your heart  
Cause that's the truth of who you really are  
If you should stumble if you should fall  
They'll wash you clean just to recall

In my eyes you shine so bright  
And in my eyes you are dressed in white  
A precious child in my eyes*

It took a while to calm herself, and she held it in so she wouldn't sob. Her voice still shook a little when she spoke. "My mother gave you this. And you endured her crying to get it?"

"I was surprised she let me have it. And a little surprised she didn't question me when I asked for a picture in the first place."

Deanna folded the paper carefully and returned it and the picture to Jean-Luc's inside pocket. " Did Mother tell you anything else when she let you have this?"

"No. But. . . she did cry, as you say. She's not been herself, cygne. Certainly not the Lwaxana Troi I know."

Sitting up, Deanna shivered a little as his arm slipped off her bare shoulders. "It's getting colder."

"I should take you home. You should be getting as much sleep as possible, given all the emotional turmoil today. And here you are, out without a coat again."

"Coats are bothersome. I hate carrying them around -- besides, that's what you're here for, to keep me warm."

"Is that it? All this time I thought you put up with me just for the sex." He was trying to lift her mood again. Sidling closer as they started back up the path, she put an arm around his waist.

"No, that's why I moved in with you."

"I thought that was for larger quarters."

"Icing on the cake."

"Do you have to put your cold fingers down the back of my pants?"

"I told you, you're supposed to keep me warm."

On the way back to the car, which was parked some distance from the restaurant, he transferred his jacket to her shoulders. They rode home in silence but sat close. She smiled all the way, until they were coming up the drive, at which point he said, "What are you thinking that's so amusing?"

"About what a perfect gentleman you are compared to the other young men who have returned me to my mother's house this late at night."

Wry amusement from him at that. "You've just about guaranteed that I'll be staying on my side of the bed. Honestly, making me think about all the men who've had their hands all over you -- you could have simply said you weren't in the mood."

"I have plenty to think about myself if I care to, you know. All those elephants of yours, and you once asked my permission to see Nella -- "

"I was talking to the ship's counselor, not my wife. And I did *not* ask your permission."

"Did so."

"I asked what you would say if I *did* ask permission."

"Semantics."

"Brat."

"It's your fault I even said anything -- you asked what I was thinking." She laid her head on his shoulder. "But remember, I didn't marry any of *them.* And it would have been a lot less work if I had, sweet fish."

In the minimal light of the porch lamp as the car stopped, he bent his head to look at her, pondering. "I'm glad everything worked out this way, Deanna. Even if I have to endure the agony of watching you attempt self-destruction in the line of duty." He grinned. "And even if I have to put up with your underwear showing up in odd places at inappropriate times. At least it was only Geordi and deLio in the ready room with me when Geordi noticed that bit of lace up my sleeve."

"You're still having trouble with that? I thought you'd long since gotten in the habit of checking for stray clothing." Otherwise she never would have put it in his drawer in the first place. Making him grumble was one thing; embarrassing him in front of other crew quite another. Perhaps it was time to end the underwear game.

"I got lazy. Discovered that dainty little bit of teal nothing you hardly ever wear stuck to my pants when I got in the lift -- I was going to keep it hidden in my sleeve until I had an opportunity to grumble at you about it."

"I wondered where that went. Did you give it to Geordi, or deLio?"

He snorted and collapsed against the back of the seat. "Why do I let myself be surprised any more?"

"Because you're trying too hard to amuse me. I love you, too."

The porch light flicked on and off four times. Both of them laughed at it. "That hasn't happened to me in -- never mind. I suppose we should go inside," he said, kissing her forehead.

"Oh, I don't know. It's nice to be sitting in the car talking after a date. At least the lighting's all wrong and she won't be able to take pictures of me again."

"Your own mother did that to you?"

Deanna dropped her eyes to her lap and smoothed her skirt. "Mother has always been unconventional by anyone's standards. She did her best to be what I needed, when I needed it. Even when she was never certain what that was. If that meant being outrageous to distract me, she did so. Sometime it feels safer to be outrageous than serious." She sat up and watched his face, half in shadow. "What's wrong?"

"Your mother and father were hajira. Did you know that?" he murmured.

"No." It shocked her to silence for a few moments. "How did you find out?"

"Baymei mentioned it. I suspected, but wasn't certain. It would explain her behavior."

She weighed her perception of his emotions. "Am I imagining this or are you starting to be less irritated by her?"

"Our conversation earlier over the pictures was. . . odd. She was trying to be her usual flippant self, but didn't seem quite up to it." He reached for the door latch. "Perhaps we remind her of what she no longer has, and it makes her miss him all over again. If that's the case, I can certainly understand and empathize with it -- Baymei also mentioned that I remind him of your father."

"I wish I could remember Daddy better. I only know him from a child's perspective, and through the few things my mother would share with me."

He helped her out of the car, unnecessary but she accepted it anyway. "If it's true that I remind her of your father. . . ."

"Jean-Luc, don't speculate." She touched his arm, stepping in to brush her lips along his. "She may find you attractive, but I don't believe she's had any thought of actively pursuing you for quite some time. Any more than you had any ideas about walking out on Chandra's arm."

"I think I'll just sleep in the solarium with the vines," he growled.

"Chandra is a beautiful woman. I'd worry if you didn't have *some* reaction to her flashing most of her chest in your face."

"Must you sound so damn matter of fact about it?"

She hesitated, frowning. "We should go inside."

"Dee. . . I'm sorry," he said at once, touching his knuckles to her cheek. "I didn't mean to be snappish. All this talk about other people -- elephants -- "

"I can see that we are both getting tired and that we have more serious matters in mind, and that it's tainted our attempts at levity."

"Thank you, Commander."

She smiled lopsidedly at him. "I did take that tone, didn't I? How about this? Take your madame off to bed and massage her poor feet."

"After you, madame." He gestured at the door as the porch light flickered again. "And if we go out again in the next few days, I'm going to break that switch."

"When we go out again. And don't you dare. It's her duty as a mother to flash the lights when a dashing young man spends too much time ravishing her daughter on the doorstep."

His mock-scowl didn't hold. The toe-curling smile made its appearance; slipping her hands up his shoulders and around his neck, she kissed him. He was slow to respond but he did finally, flinching when another frenzied winking of the light ensued.

And suddenly he clutched her against him, going from tentative to passionate in an instant. The light went out and stayed out. Jean-Luc kept kissing her, leaving the taste of coffee in her mouth. She staggered against him when he finally let go. He caught her up in his arms and swayed, then started toward the house.

"Oh! Jean-Luc, this isn't very -- "

"Hush." Instead of going in the door, he went to the side gate, nudged the latch with his shoulder, pushed through and carried her along the end of the house. As he approached the window of their room he shifted her weight in his arms and aimed her at it. He put her feet first through it and sat her on the sill. Once she was inside, he ducked through behind her, pulled the curtains out of the way, and closed the window.

"You planned that."

"Contingency planning can be a good thing."

"Especially when you want to avoid meeting your date's mother at the door."

They stopped as if by agreement and stared at each other. It was dark, and like last night, the moonlight spilled through the window and pooled on the floor. Her eyes adjusted until she could see him -- he'd moved away from the window, and casually undid the cuffs of his white shirt while he watched her.

Deanna closed the window, then shrugged off the jacket and tossed it over the back of the chair in the corner. Slipping the straps off her shoulders, she let the dress fall in a shimmering circle on the carpet and stepped out of her shoes. It felt good to be flat-footed again. The heels hadn't been very high, but enough to cramp her feet after a few hours. Discarding the bra was sheer bliss. She hadn't realized how much it bit into her flesh until it was gone.

Yves was an ever-present weight pulling at her muscles, but he had been mostly still for hours; now he fluttered to life with a kick. The nightly athletics were about to begin. He wasn't large enough to cause discernible bumps in her abdomen on a regular basis, but the sensation of flocks of birds in her belly often woke her up at night. She stood with her hands in the small of her back and took a deep breath.

Her baby. What would Betazed be to him, if she felt so displaced here? She was half human, he would be three-quarters. What would the Fifth House mean to Yves, or his siblings? Especially his sister, or sisters? What if he were an only child?

"Deanna?"

The concern in his voice startled her out of the emotional downward spiral. She hadn't realized how far down she'd gone. Raising her head, she saw that he'd stripped and stood watching her, uncertain of what to make of her sudden plunge.

"Sorry," she husked, turning toward the bed. "I must be even more tired than I thought. More hormonal melancholy, on top of everything else."

&lt;Little One?&gt;

Her mother's inquiry only made her hesitate a split-second as she pulled back the covers. &lt;I'm fine. We came in the back. Is everything all right? Jean-Luc is concerned about you.&gt;

It wasn't like her mother to hesitate this way. Less like her to answer as she did. &lt;Your father would be very happy about your marriage. He would be so proud of you, Deanna. I don't think he would have expected you to be a first officer. It certainly surprised me.&gt;

Deanna sat on one bent leg on the edge of the bed and stared at her husband. He sat on his side of the bed, and met her gaze. "Dee?"

&lt;Good night, sleep well,&gt; her mother continued with none of her usual good cheer. From playing games with the porch light to this. Jean-Luc was right -- something was different. He wasn't just picking up on the difference between Ambassador Troi, abroad and outrageous, and Lwaxana Troi, at home being no less forthright but less outrageous. Something was going on with her mother.

Sending unspoken reassurance to Jean-Luc, Deanna lay under the covers, rolling on her side in the attempt to find a comfortable position and silently begging Yves to settle down. He began another jig that subsided a moment later when his father threw an arm over her and rubbed circles around her navel.

When Jean-Luc's lips found the back of her neck and he undid the fastener in her hair, she realized just how distracted she was -- she hadn't brushed out her hair.

"It's your fault, you know," she murmured while he ran his fingers through her curls. Full stop, with a fistful of her hair. Then he extricated his fingers and stroked her arm where it lay on the covers.

"It is?"

"It was so easy before, to come home and live in Mother's world for a while. Where Walima didn't play a part, and all I had to contend with was a visit to Daddy's grave or shopping with Chandra. It was hard after the war because of the aftermath of the Dominion's occupation, but in a different way. You question everything, with your eyes. You question the House and the way my mother behaves, and my expression in Baymei's pictures."

He said nothing, continued to caress her arm and waited. The waiting was the hardest to take. Twisting to look up at him propped over her on one elbow, she saw only his silhouette.

"I won't hide anything from you, Jean-Luc. But it's difficult."

"I can see that."

"It's hard to admit something you've done that was so wretchedly wrong. Harder to admit it to your commanding officer, or your husband, and I don't know which aspect I find more difficult. And telling you this is in a way an invasion of Mother's privacy, but it was my fault."

He considered that for a few moments while gripping her hand lightly. "You don't have to feel that I'll judge you harshly. I'm supposed to be biased, remember? Play favorites? Have I done such a good job of being unbiased that you're afraid I'll be unsympathetic?"

"I've never told anyone about any of this before."

"I could say that about so many things that I've told you. Remember what I told you in the beginning? That I wanted to trust you completely? You've obviously trusted me -- hajira tells me so. I don't want to push you on this, but Counselor Troi would quote you all kinds of reasons that repressing deep dark -- "

"Jean-Luc. Please. Consider me nudged." She sighed heavily. "You know counselors are their own worst patients. I'm not repressing things, just keeping them to myself. There is a difference."

"I'm told I'm a good listener." He squeezed her hand and waited patiently.

"I've never wished anyone ill," she whispered, closing her eyes as a tear escaped and ran off the tip of her nose. "Except that day, when Walima and Mother argued. They were so close. Like sisters. Then they fought, because of me -- I've never seen Mother strike anyone, not before or since. It was my fault."

"I doubt that."

"It was. I could have said nothing about what I sensed. I should have suffered with the knowledge on my own. I promised myself it would never happen again."

He pulled her hair away from her face gently, touching the back of her neck again. As if he knew what it meant -- he'd been doing that all afternoon and evening, whenever the opportunity presented itself. "So you've done that ever since -- kept everything to yourself. And I've asked you time and time again to break that silence."

"It's different when it's in the line of duty. It's different with a patient. I'm not pursuing personal interests in either case. I swore I would never do what I did to Walima again. I can't forgive myself for what I did to Mother."

"You were young, and hurt -- "

"No. No." Her eyes stung with it. "I did it on purpose. I hated Walima, for pitying me. I hated that she looked down on us because of Daddy. I kept asking her questions, looking for more reasons, more confirmations of things that I could hate her for. I knew Mother would be so angry she would disown her. It was the most selfish, hateful thing I've ever done. And I've since realized that I might have misread her emotions, attributed the pity incorrectly -- I could have been wrong. She could have pitied me for other reasons, and my asking leading questions that way colored her responses. I was immature and stupid."

"What about talking to your mother? She might be able to help you sort it out."

"The last time I mentioned Walima's name to her, she shouted at me and then felt terrible about shouting. I don't know what to expect from her if I tried to discuss it, but it isn't likely to be positive."

"You could try."

"I don't know. It's already cost me so much. That picture of me in the green dress was taken a year after Walima was cast out of the House. Mother was being so giddy and silly, and underneath it all she grieved, because in addition to being my birthday it was her wedding anniversary. And then Walima sent her a gift out of spite. A small ornamental plate with the Tree of Telistra on it. Shortly after it was delivered, Mother disappeared from the party. I went looking for Mother and found her upstairs in that room, holding the plate and standing in front of the Telistra window, sobbing. She clung to me as if I were the only thing keeping her from leaping out the window. All her guards were down, all her emotions laid bare, and it was terrible. I realized how lonely she was. How terrible it was for her. She lost Kestra, then Daddy, and then she lost her closest friend -- and losing Walima was my fault. I didn't know about Kestra but I knew how she felt, and I blamed Walima for that, until years later when it occurred to me I might have misinterpreted everything."

By the time she reached that point, he had taken her into his arms, spooning against her to offer what comfort he could. It helped. Pausing, she borrowed his composure and let his love soothe her to calm.

"The Telistra is a legendary tree that sprouted over the graves of Neva and her love, Oravin. It's a symbol of eternal love. It's said that the tree had the sweetest smelling blossoms in the world, and that it still blooms somewhere in a hidden grove, even through winter. The window was a gift from Hayava to her husband -- it's tradition to give a gift to the father of your child to celebrate the birth. Marking the occasion with a permanent extravagance like a commissioned artwork was common in the Houses, and still is."

And then realization struck, and it made it all the worse thinking about this -- she sobbed, and the sudden increase in her distress brought Jean-Luc upright. She sat up and let him hold her, winding her arms around his waist.

"I didn't know my parents were hajira," she murmured, trying to keep her voice even. "But it makes sense -- the poem the term comes from was supposedly written by Oravin for Neva. That was why Walima chose Telistra to send to Mother. She knew it would hurt her worst of all."

"This was years ago, Dee. Your mother might feel differently now. If all that's left is regret, reparations could still be made. You could help her make them."

It pulled her into the present. Closing her eyes, she rested her forehead against his shoulder. "When Mother finally remembered Kestra, one of the things I helped her remember was her gift to my father when Kestra was born. It was a glass replica of a Telistra blossom. The clues were there, but I didn't see -- all the pain she felt that day -- "

"It was her pain in your eyes, in the picture," Jean-Luc whispered. "Just as it was my pain, when I saw the same expression on your face in one of our counseling sessions. It was your mother's loneliness and pain." She almost snapped at him for being relieved, but obviously that had been of some importance to him -- and after a moment his focus returned to the issue of her mother's grief. "But she's not angry now, Dee. All I see is sadness. She cried this morning, and again when I asked for a picture -- pain, but not the sharp kind, just sadness. If you could get Walima to talk to her -- "

"If I could, there's no guarantee it won't turn into another fight."

"You don't want to try. You're telling me you can be a first officer, swallow communications equipment, face down eight foot reptiles, keep a cool head while surrounded by anything from Borg to lascivious six-fingered -- "

"We are talking about my mother. Are you forgetting this?"

"Madame is carrying on the grand Picard tradition of running away from family difficulties, I see."

She winced. "It's not that simple."

"You can fix your mistake, or at least do all you can toward that end. I never took the chance when I had it. Give me the satisfaction of knowing you learned from my stupidity."

"Naive fish. You don't understand the people involved."

"That woman in front of the restaurant wanted to talk to you, and she didn't seem angry. She looked at you as if she might hug you. I kept you from turning around because I could tell you were angry enough to be unpredictable. That doesn't make me unethical by your standards, I hope -- acting on what I perceived of other people's feelings?"

"I want to resolve it. I've tried. But it can only be resolved if both parties are willing, and Mother gets angry if you even mention Walima's name in her presence. The times I've tried to call Walima she hung up -- "

"If I went home to see Father with you, as you are right now, he would have talked to me." He ran a hand over her belly again. "Perhaps it would have been a very superficial conversation at first. But, I would bet that if seeing grandchildren were -- "

She laughed at it bitterly. "If she didn't like Daddy and she pitied me, what's she going to think of my children?"

"Possibly that she missed you and your mother for the last few decades, and she'd better start thinking more rationally if she doesn't want to miss knowing your children? I hate to bring it up, but I do have a little insight into being a grandparent, too. Kamin had a grandson. If you were as close to Walima as you say, she may feel the same -- perhaps she did pity you, but does that mean she didn't care for you?"

Deanna sighed and leaned on his bare chest. "I'm tired."

"And stubborn."

"You don't understand -- "

"I understand that you're operating under a double standard. You wouldn't let me get away with this, if our positions were reversed."

"What was I thinking, marrying my patient? I forgot about the vengeance factor."

"Vengeance has nothing to do with it. Wanting to spare you the pain of knowing you had this chance and didn't take it has everything to do with it. You loved Walima, your mother loved her, and it isn't too late -- you really didn't sense how she felt at the restaurant? Because I think if you had you might be more willing to make the effort."

"All right, I'll try. Even if I know what will happen -- what always happens, when I start noodging in my own family. I'll talk to Mother tomorrow, if she stays around long enough. She's supposed to meet with some of the other House ladies about the Festival, because it's at the Fifth House." She settled down again, patting his shoulder before pulling her hand under the covers. "You always have to turn our leave into an adventure just out of general principle, don't you?"

"I'm sorry, I keep trying to have a dull life, but then I married this officer of mine and even those boring hours I used to spend reading turned into adventures." He massaged her shoulders. "I love you, Deebird."

"I love you, too, Jean-Fish. And, quite suddenly, for the first time in a week, I'd also love some lekarra." He started to rise, but she caught his arm. "Stay put, I'll go. It isn't as though I'm an invalid."

By the time she had put on a robe, gone to the kitchen, hunted high and low for the lekarra she knew Homn had stocked up on for her visit, and returned, he was asleep. Pulling the robe tighter around herself, Deanna ate another lekarra from the jar and went to the window. She looked at his jacket where she'd left it on the back of the chair and fished the picture and drawing out of the pocket. Studying the picture in the moonlight while Jean-Luc began to snore, she smiled sadly, then slipped out of the room again, easing the door shut behind her.

\------------------------

Morning, he realized as he sat up. Another day on Betazed. And for some reason, he was alone. The covers were cold on her side of the bed.

Dressing quickly, he sought her, hoping he could detect her, but either the bond wasn't strong enough for that or she was out of his limited range. Wild theories rambled through his mind, but he set them aside and went to search the house. Noises in the kitchen told him breakfast was under way; he heard Lwaxana's directions to Homn over the clatter of a pan, but no Deanna. Checking in the rooms along the hall, he made his way upstairs. In the library at the head of the stairs he found her curled up in a chair in the corner near the window, a quilt wrapped around her. A very old quilt -- Terran, he suspected.

He watched her sleep, curls wild around her head and the faded gingham tucked up around her, only her nose and closed eyes peeping out, and imagined her as a little girl. In front of the window on a desk, which he recognized with a start as a Terran antique, were the picture and blue pony, flipped upside down so the verses were visible -- and another piece of paper. Intrigued, he picked up the paper and recognized Deanna's handwriting.

*There's a picture on the wall  
Taken back when I was small  
You are standing next to me  
I loved you the most of all

We would watch the winters thaw  
You would sing and I would draw  
animals and things for you  
In colors that you never saw

And my blue pony's taking me for a ride  
Down to where we used to go  
I'll see your smile and touch your face  
And my heart will overflow

Now the years have washed our times away  
Like footprints in the rain  
And the house is gone  
With the days we shared  
But our love will still remain.*

He looked up at the wall to the left of the desk, where a number of pictures hung, and saw mostly individual and group shots. Only one picture had Deanna and one other person. He took it down and studied it, trying to make sense of this. At first he'd thought the poem referred to her father -- he'd assumed the writing on the back of the blue pony to be his. The poem she'd written seemed to hint at someone being gone forever -- but the only picture on the wall of Deanna when she was small, and standing with another person, was of herself and her mother.

Again, that feeling of being adrift on the ocean, with unknown depths beneath his boat, and him with no diving gear. Had she felt this way when they were at his chateau, when all of his own history threatened to drown him?

Carefully, hoping the old wooden desk chair wouldn't creak, he sat down and contemplated the verses. The ones on the back of the pony drawing didn't sound like a mother to her daughter. The writing seemed masculine, with sharper letters -- he'd seen Lwaxana's writing on other things, including the back of the photograph in front of him, and hers had more flourishes and fewer angles. It seemed likely the verses had been Ian's doing.

So the ones Deanna had written weren't responding to the verses, but meant for her mother. Perhaps she meant to communicate along a similar theme -- remember who you are in my eyes. Remember I love you no matter what happens, or how things change.

He rubbed his lip, thinking, while to his right Deanna stirred in slumber and made a quiet noise, not quite a moan but not a word. Watching her for a moment and remembering how far she had come in so many ways from their first mission at Farpoint, he smiled and picked up the pen, finding a clean sheet of paper in one of the drawers. When he was done, he read through his effort, curled his lip, and edited, then recopied on yet another sheet of paper, folding the revisions and tossing it in a wastebasket under the desk. Satisfied that he'd at least managed to make it understandable, he read it one more time.

*I've seen your dreams get broken  
I've heard your words unspoken  
And sometimes hope is laying low  
Hidden in the ashes left after the fire

I've seen a faithless lover  
Take you down to deep water  
And I have watched a fragile wing  
Tangled up in longings get broken in the struggle

In my heart I see you run free  
Like a river down to the sea  
All the chains that held you down  
Will be in pieces on the ground  
You'll drink the rain and ride the wind to me

Someday your tears will turn to diamonds  
With a kiss you'll wake up to see  
That you're strong at the broken places  
I know someday you'll go free.*

Not exactly on a par with Shakespeare, but it said what he wanted to say. He left it on the desk next to Deanna's effort, stroked her hair lightly, and left her curled in the chair.

Homn was alone in the kitchen, cooking some bland-smelling food, when Jean-Luc wandered in. The servant gestured at the door. Jean-Luc found Lwaxana at the table on the patio, atypically silent and dressed in a wild purple creation with a high collar. But when her head came up, she was beaming as usual.

"Good morning, dear. Try some of these -- they're just wonderful," she exclaimed, waving a hand at an assortment of colorful things on a tray. "How is our little one feeling this morning?"

"I left her sleeping this time." Jean-Luc reached for the broad-bellied tea pot and a cup. When he looked up again, he found her watching him intently. "She's fine."

"Enjoyed your dinner, I hope?"

Trying to decipher exactly why this question bothered him, he replied, "Yes, very much. Though we did encounter someone she knew, and it was quite awkward for a few moments."

Lwaxana dropped a green item and frowned, watching it bounce away. "Drat. I like those. Really? And who might that have been?"

"Her friend Chandra. She seems nice enough."

"Oh, well, she's a very pleasant, if somewhat misguided, girl. I tried to set her up with a distant relation of mine -- she wouldn't have it. As if he was so disagreeable -- he's just a little forgetful, that's all, and it isn't as though he *meant* to call her by his sister's name." She found another green thing and looked it over with undue skepticism. "Did you meet anyone else? I have so many friends in town, I'm sure they all would love to meet you."

He considered confronting her directly. This was too suspicious. She was fishing too obviously, and he wondered if she didn't already know about Walima, but it was none of his business, officially. "No, we didn't speak to anyone else. Unless you count the waiter a friend?"

Lwaxana smiled serenely and popped the tidbit in her mouth. "You surprised me yesterday," she said, filling her plate with more tidbits from the tray. "Asking me for that picture. Why were you so interested in finding out what she was like as a child?"

"Why shouldn't I be? She expressed curiosity about my childhood. She even crawled around in my attic looking in boxes."

"Well, you could have just asked *me,* Jean-Luc -- I probably remember her childhood much better than she does. I'm certain she doesn't recall quite a bit of it. Children never do -- they have such subjective memories. You didn't have to go looking at the Fifth House, either -- I never go there myself any more unless I have to, it's such a stuffy great big echoing place. The only really interesting things there are the Chalice and the Rings -- you did see them, didn't you?" Her usual sing-song tone and carefree air seemed a little *too* carefree.

"Actually. . . no, we didn't. We were late for the tour. And then we met Baymei, and Deanna fell asleep so I brought her back -- "

"All that way and you didn't even see them?" Lwaxana's voice spiraled higher and louder. "Jean-Luc! The most important part of our heritage, you go all that distance and you don't even make a point of -- "

"Lwaxana -- "

" -- what was Deanna thinking? All the way to see the House and she introduces you to the *gardener* instead of showing you the most important symbols of -- "

" -- pass me the -- " He pointed as he spoke, and she snatched up the plate of large pink pastries and fairly tossed them to him, dropping the plate short of meeting his fingers, never missing a beat.

" -- our heritage, honestly, a daughter of the Fifth House and she can't even acquaint her own husband with our customs, even though you're obviously curious and wanting to know -- "

This time, he simply pointed at the plate he wanted, and she repeated the procedure of nearly sending its contents rolling across the table in several directions. He ate while she continued, tuning out most of what she said and letting the words flow around him like water around a rock in the middle of a stream. He refilled his cup, held up the pot with a raised eyebrow, and she held up her own cup for him to refill it without so much as a second's pause in her tirade.

When it ended abruptly, he glanced up, affecting casual interest. She stared across the table, both hands in her lap. "You haven't heard a word I've said."

"No," he replied simply, with practiced calm. "I heard about the first fifty words or so. When it became variations on a theme I stopped listening."

"Rude."

"You're wrong. Deanna respects her heritage. She doesn't like all aspects of it, but she respects it."

"Rude," she exclaimed, throwing her napkin on the table. "Absolutely unacceptable. You will *not* disrespect me at my own breakfast table -- "

"Or what? You'll make me sleep out in the men's house, with the rest of the concubines?"

The Betazoid Death Glare was hereditary. Her eyes went hard and glittering. Cold. "You would choose that bit of our history to counter with, wouldn't you? Pick the things that are least flattering to use against -- "

"My history is just as unflattering as yours," he snapped. "My ancestors were just as capable of injustice. You were the one who tried to rescue Timicin from his own traditions -- why haven't you done more to help rescue Deanna from your own? All that nonsense about arranged marriage, genetic bonding -- "

"You and your insistence that Deanna can make her own decisions! Look at you, deciding she needs to be rescued from her own family, her heritage -- and what about your precious prime directive? Doesn't it have something to say about insisting other cultures rearrange their traditions?"

"Do you honestly believe she would have been happy with Wyatt Miller?" He heard his own belligerence and wished he could call it back. That was the captain demanding an explanation from ensigns goofing off, not a house guest. "I'm sorry," he said at once in gentler tones. "This wasn't a good subject for breakfast conversation."

He picked up a pastry and ate it, regardless of how sweet and sticky the thing was -- a far cry from a croissant. Nipping off small bits of it rather than taking normal-sized bites seemed to help.

"Are we supposed to paint our own faces for the Festival, or is there someone to do that for us?" he asked casually.

"We do our own." Her flat, angry tone surprised him. She hadn't bounced back into frivolity.

"It's an interesting custom," he said, pleasantly as he could. "Humans have interesting customs, as well, you know. In France there are a variety of old festivals that persist to this day -- the Feria de Nîîmes, for example, in which they run the bulls through the streets and hold bullfights, similar to what they do in Spain. And speaking of Spain -- in Bunol, they hold La Tomatina on the fourth Wednesday of August. Thousands of people crowding the streets, with music and food, all of them throwing tomatoes -- it's a sight to see. Then there's the Carnaval di Ivrea in Italy, where in the course of acting out a historical pagaent, the people throw Sicilian blood oranges at one another, re-enacting a political rebellion that actually took place centuries ago. And of course, one can't forget the festivities in May in Randwick, England -- they take huge Gloucester cheeses and roll them down a hill, and everyone tries to catch them. It being in England in spring, it's very wet and the hill is quite muddy, so everyone ends up filthy from head to toe, but -- "

A stifled, inarticulate noise from Lwaxana interrupted him. She had her hand over her mouth. Whether she would laugh or cry was uncertain -- she looked as though she might do either. She dropped it to her lap, revealing the tiny smile, and smirked at him across the table. "Do you honestly expect me to believe people actually chase cheese down a hill, Jean-Luc? And throwing fruit at each other? Ridiculous!"

"Is it any more ridiculous than painting your face and reciting long soliloquies about the House history? Any sillier than bonding a pair of six-year-olds and expecting it to work? And if you're so fussy about tradition, why bond her to a human who isn't likely to care about Betazoid customs?"

"The Millers were my husband's very good friends!" Lwaxana shot out of her chair and stalked in a circle on her end of the patio. "Tradition dictates that we choose the offspring of -- "

"He didn't have any Betazoid friends? He was naturalized, he took the name, he lived here -- and you didn't even *like* Mrs. Miller! You spent the entire reception fighting with her, frightening her with your pet vine, insisting that everyone had to follow Betazoid tradition -- yet I get the feeling you dislike it as much as your daughter does."

"I am a daughter of the Fifth House," she announced, drawing herself up straighter, "holder of -- "

"Yes, yes, the chalice, the rings -- but you are also a Federation Ambassador, and a mother. And frankly, I find your accomplishments in those roles far more impressive than any attempt to perpetuate outdated traditions. You don't have to live them out to remember them." He put down his cup with a crack of glass against the hard tabletop. "You seem to be intentionally enslaving yourself to antiquated, restrictive practices that place unnecessary burdens on your daughter. Yet you call harmless customs ridiculous -- which is accurate, in many cases, but at least chasing gigantic cheeses down a hill won't inflict needless emotional pain -- "

"Just who do you think you are?" She propped her hands on her hips and glowered down at him. "What gives you the right to criticize my heritage?"

"I married your daughter, who apparently is expected to continue that heritage. And how curious, that everyone is surprised that I would want anything to do with Alipha -- is it just me, or do men not care much for the idea of being reminded at every Festival or ceremony that their role as members of the House is so minimal?"

"You have no right to judge, you don't know -- "

"So explain it to me! Explain to me what I should know, that would make actual participation in House tradition endurable!" He stood and locked gazes over the table with her. "I told you I came here to understand. I had hoped to find something beyond what I've read, beyond what Deanna has told me. I had also hoped to find that you and I could find a way to be more at ease with each other -- yet here we are, shouting at each other over breakfast."

She tossed her head and flung out her hands. "I thought we were making such progress, and now I find you have no intention of even *trying* to understand what it means to be a member of the Fifth House. You showed such interest in the pictures, in the Festival -- "

"And still you evade the issue -- how is this going to help me understand?" Jean-Luc backhanded a low-swinging branch of blossoms away impatiently when it swayed down to tap him on the shoulder. He collected himself and met her hostile glare again. "My father died before I could find a way to make peace with him. He wanted me to follow in his footsteps, follow our traditions, and I wanted the freedom to make my own decisions, and neither of us was willing to admit error or take blame, or give just enough to meet halfway. That didn't have to happen. There is always a way, a compromise to be made, some sort of agreement can be reached. You don't have to argue about it for the rest of your life! With me, or anyone else! And Deanna shouldn't have to abandon her life on the ship when she comes here, or be unable to talk about her childhood."

Lwaxana's fury reached the boiling point. He stood his ground when she came around the table, and it seemed to give her pause -- she stopped just short of him, pulling herself back to haughty composure. "I fail to see what your difficulty with your father has to do with the Fifth House."

"When I went to see your house, I noticed immediately that Deanna was uncomfortable there. Discussing it with her resulted in the revelation that contrary to everything I've been told about Betazoids and how open they are, you have plenty of secrets, after all. That there are things you hide -- as if I didn't already know that from having you end up in my sickbay fighting repressed memories!" He slapped away the insistent branch again. "While Deanna isn't repressing anything, the memories do make her sad, and angry. She seems to think that attempting to discuss them with you would be futile. I imagine she would know that from experience, but resistance has always been one of my areas of expertise -- I resist the notion that simply because someone behaved a certain way in the past, they will continue to behave in like fashion. People change. I've changed, and many of the positive changes in my life can be directly attributed to Deanna, whether from her efforts as a counselor or from her influence as my wife. I owe her -- regardless of her insistence that she acted out of duty, or simply did her job as counselor, the debt is there. I would not be who I am now without her. And you played a significant part in making her who she is."

As he spoke, he approached Lwaxana, backing her slowly across the patio. She still looked angry, but as his tone softened her expression did so as well.

"You can be reasonable, and you can be rational," he said as she ran into the low wall at the edge of the pavement. "You raised a little girl by yourself, and she became a strong, intelligent, responsible adult -- that doesn't happen by chance. The Festival, the tradition, meeting Deanna's friends and cousins -- it's all well and good, but it's more important to me that what little family we have doesn't fall victim to senseless squabbling. And whether you or I like it or not, we are family. You are my wife's mother, my child's grandmother. I want my children to have as much stability in their family as possible. I refuse to see it splintered apart by senseless fights over antiquated customs."

"Ah, I see," Lwaxana exclaimed with a laugh. "So you want me to simply abandon the Fifth House, and all it stands for -- "

"I want you to know where I stand," he exclaimed, holding up a finger just short of her nose. "I want you to understand that my children will make their own decisions. Their home is with their parents, wherever they are. If any child of mine wishes to participate in any aspect of Betazoid culture, he or she will have my full support. I'll be certain they learn as much as possible about both cultures, raise them to respect both traditions -- but there will be no ultimatums issued by anyone, no attempts to force them to embrace either one. Is that clear?"

"Am I supposed to salute or will a simple 'yes, sir' be sufficient?" she replied archly, raising an eyebrow.

Jean-Luc let his hand drop. "You aren't listening to me."

"Have you ever listened to me?"

Jean-Luc stared at her a moment, then backed a few steps, half-turning away from her. He leaned on the edge of the table and contemplated the clean brown flagstones under his feet. "I've been trying to understand. I think you hide too much from Deanna."

"Don't be absurd! I don't hide anything."

"Lwaxana, you don't talk about Ian, you don't talk about Deanna's childhood, and you don't let anyone see you as anything but a Daughter of the Fifth House. You're hiding."

"That's a lie! I have plenty of friends and relatives who know -- "

"All right -- you won't let *me* see you as anything but a Daughter of the Fifth House. You let me look at pictures of your family but you say nothing about them. When I enjoyed finding a candid shot of a little girl being happy and her childish drawing of a blue pony with a big smile on its face, you cried but you offer no explanation and you accept no comfort -- and this morning one of the first things out of your mouth is the assertion that grown children have subjective memories and I should have asked you if I wanted to know anything about Deanna's childhood. You're hiding from me -- hiding your feelings and the truth about the past. All you'll discuss are the Fifth House, the Festival, and Deanna. Safe subjects, ones that won't expose you as a person."

"There are things that don't need to be exposed," Lwaxana said, her tone hard and cold. "If you're so concerned about Deanna's feelings, you should trust me."

They stared at each other for long, silent moments. He crossed his arms and tilted his head slightly. "Should I? I don't understand your relationship with her."

"What is there to understand? I'm her mother," she exclaimed, waving a hand. "That should tell you enough."

"Why haven't you told her very much about her father? Why is it so difficult to put forth the effort?"

"If she wanted to know more about him, all she has to do is ask me -- I don't understand why you're so upset about this!" Lwaxana gestured dismissively at him.

"Her father would have wanted you to tell her more about him than she knows."

"You don't know what he wanted," she snapped, flinging away the statement with a flick of her hand. "You can't -- "

"I do know that if anything happened to me, I would *expect* Deanna to tell my son everything she could about me, if only to counter the nonsense he would hear from other people. I've learned something, over the years, and it's come to me slowly and painfully. The more disconnected we are from our roots, the less satisfying our accomplishments become. It's all well and good to join Starfleet and uphold principles and ideals, but it's a hollow and lonely life when you don't have family." He hesitated, taking a deep breath. "Lwaxana, I'm sorry if I remind you of Ian. I know what it's like to lose someone you love -- I know that it would be excruciating if I were to lose Deanna. It must have been difficult to lose hajira and keep up a brave front for the sake of your child. But I would think that having her help you through your difficulties with the memory of Kestra would have shown you that now, years afterward, you can -- "

"Stop it," she blurted, pressing the back of her hand to her lips. "Just stop. You don't know what you're saying -- you have no idea what it's like to lose your hajira. All you know is the joy."

"You didn't experience loss when he left on his routine tour of duty, did you?"

"What are you talking about?" Her voice still wobbled, but it had distracted her. "What loss?"

"Everyone I've discussed it with has said the same thing. No one expects it, not with a human -- Deanna didn't even recognize the symptoms at first because they were different than what two Betazoids would experience. You didn't experience the loss until he died. It's different with us -- we've suffered it each time we've been apart. The only thing that made it tolerable was the knowledge that it was temporary."

She stared, now completely distracted, and leaned against the wall. For a few moments her eyes were as haunted and woeful as Deanna's had been in the picture on Baymei's wall. She recovered slowly, blinking, a few tears clinging to her lashes.

"How did you know Ian and I were hajira?"

"I suspected you were. You never speak of him, you still seem distressed by his loss, and you were far too upset about Deanna and I. You wouldn't want to repeat the pain of losing someone you loved that much all over again, so you react to anyone who could be hajira with the most outrageous behavior possible, to drive him away. Which isn't to say that there would be *any* interest on my part -- simply that the potential was there. If it weren't it wouldn't have happened with Deanna, after all."

"Oh, goddess," she sighed, shaking her head and smiling in rueful whimsy. "You sound just like Deanna."

Jean-Luc brushed his hands on his pants and grimaced. "I do, don't I? Unlike you, I was actually her patient for quite some time." He paused, waiting for the temptation to pass, then grinned and gave in. "You could say she's rubbing off on me."

Lwaxana wavered on the verge of laughter but her smile collapsed. Tears rolled; she used the sleeve of her robe to dab at them. "The way you feel about her is so obvious. It was such a shock to see it, when I came aboard on the way to Adnalon -- I wanted to just beam right back to the transport and run away. It isn't that I don't want her to be happy, hajira is just so rare that I've not had to confront it before and having it right in front of me. . . . When Ian died I spent so many months not being able to breath, with a great hollow space in my chest, and seeing it between you made it hurt all over again."

"You could have talked to her about it."

"No." She brushed her eyes free of tears with her sleeves as fast as tears appeared. "There are some things -- she doesn't need to know how much it hurt."

"She already does. She was there, remember?"

"But she didn't. . . she was too young. I wouldn't want to inflict that on her now, it wouldn't. . . . Jean-Luc?"

It surprised him that she'd even noticed, or reacted to, his change of mood. That wasn't like her. Turning away, he headed for the door and stopped himself within four steps. She'd actually been having a conversation with him, and it had been serious. She'd been listening and now she was being responsive. Walking away from this could slam a door that might never open again. While it was a door he hadn't necessarily wanted to open, his objective would be best served by not closing it.

"I doubt that any pain you could inflict on her would measure up to the suffering I've caused her," he murmured, staring at a crack on a paving stone. "I think you grossly underestimate her ability to cope. Either that, or you're hiding behind that as an excuse to continue to avoid an unpleasant subject."

"If I wanted to be analyzed I would have simply gone to her," Lwaxana exclaimed wryly, surprising him again with her ability to spring back from the verge of weeping. "I thought you were a starship captain, not a counselor."

"What I am is a former patient of Deanna's -- an expert in denial, and in running from myself and my own issues."

"You don't understand what you're asking of me. So much pain, so much to regret. . . ."

As her voice trailed off, he glanced at her. She caught his eye with hers and stared, incredulous. The branches overhead swayed in the wind, nearly tapping his head again, but he ignored it this time.

"Why are you doing this?" she asked finally. "You don't want to."

"I told you what I wanted."

She turned her back on him, leaving him staring at her hunched shoulders beneath that high stiff collar. "I must go -- I have a meeting to attend," she announced, her blithe nonchalance and sing-song manner of speaking returning full force. "Homn! Bring around the car -- we must be off, I'll be late as it is."

Lwaxana brushed by Jean-Luc on her way inside, actually bumping him out of her way with her shoulder, and left him on the patio with the remnants of breakfast. For a moment he stood stunned -- having someone walk out in the middle of a serious conversation hadn't happened in years, didn't happen to the captain of the ship. But this wasn't the ship and she wasn't crew, or an admiral, or anyone else who normally held serious conversations with him.

He put together a plate of food for Deanna. As he passed the front hall, he heard giggling, and glanced at the front door -- Lwaxana was standing there, waiting for Homn evidently, shaking her head.

"Cheese chasing," she exclaimed, then noticed him watching her and sobered slightly. "You may be a good starship captain, Jean-Luc, but you have no skill with creating convincing fiction. Honestly -- "

"It isn't fiction," he shot back. She only laughed at him, and he left her there, stifling his frustration with her. Leaving the plate on the bed, he came back out and went upstairs -- fortunately Lwaxana had left in the few moments he was gone.

Deanna peered through slitted eyelids at him from her warm cocoon in the chair. "Why was Mother laughing so hard?"

"I amuse her, I suppose. She thinks I sound like you. I told her you were rubbing off on me."

"I'll have to tell Data his stupid old joke made her laugh. He'll appreciate that, I'm sure." She giggled as he gathered her up, putting her arms around his neck. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

"Hush, you'll ruin my self-confidence and I'll drop you."

She lay in his arms, relaxed in spite of her tease, her head against his right shoulder. He navigated out of the room without mishap, though edging through the door he barely missed bumping the back of her head against the door. At the bottom of the stairs, he miscalculated and she yelped as her thigh struck the bannister.

"Sorry. Want to walk?"

Deanna shook her head and tightened her arms.

He made it to the door of their room and sidled through. Paying too much attention to her leg not striking the edge of the door, he failed to realize how close he was to the other side until he heard the dull thud. He put her down at once and supported her as she rubbed the back of her head.

"I'm fine, don't be so guilt-ridden, Jean-Luc. Just a bump." She yawned, leaning on him and letting him help her to the bed. "Drowsy. But fine."

"Feel up to breakfast?"

"In a minute. I'd much rather you climbed back in with me."

Putting the plate on the floor -- apparently Betazoids didn't put tables next to beds as a matter of course -- he sat against the tall black headboard and she crawled in his lap, curling up against his chest and rearranging the quilt over both of them. The shirt met with her disapproval; she pulled it open, shoved it and the light jacket aside, and rubbed her cheek in his chest hair. Smiling, he let his head rest against the cold wood and closed his eyes, rubbing her shoulder and back in slow, circular patterns, bunching the fabric of her robe and smoothing it again.

"Feels good to be able to stay in bed," she sighed.

"Yes."

"Mother's gone."

"She said she was late for her meeting."

"Homn will be back shortly so we can take the car to -- "

"Sssh. Don't spoil it."

"What?"

"The moment. Remember how well you open and close me? I'm trying to relax, don't remind me of where we have to be."

The reference to one of several poems he'd quoted to her before made her smile; he felt the muscles in her cheek move against his chest. "You always find such sweet poetry for me. I wish I were so fortunate. Every time I try to read poetry I fall asleep."

"Because you need the sleep, cygne. You shouldn't feel guilty about drifting off. I should scold you for creeping off to the library last night and leaving me alone -- you were supposed to be in bed. You couldn't have been too comfortable in that chair."

"But you won't scold, because then I'd have to scold you for whacking my head on the door."

"Ssshh."

"Why, afraid I'll ruin the guilt trip? You could make it up to me by telling me where you found this poem." She produced folded paper from the front of her robe. "Sneaky fish."

"Promise you won't laugh?"

She rolled her head back to look at his face. "Why would I? It's a beautiful poem -- it made me cry. It's almost as if it were written just for me."

"It was."

He'd surprised her. Happy tears trickled from her eyes. Pushing herself up to meet him lips to lips, she dropped the paper and slipped both hands to the back of his head, a gesture he copied one-handed so he could steady her with the other. At length they parted as her stomach warbled a familiar song, and he retrieved the plate for her. She leaned against him while she ate and let him rest his hands on her belly, waiting for Yves to do something he could feel.

Yves didn't perform as hoped. When she finished eating, he reluctantly agreed that they should be ready to leave soon. He made the bed while she went to the bathroom to shower. While she dressed, he watched her, thinking. She came to sit next to him on the edge of the bed.

"Moody fish."

"Just thinking about your mother and her turns of mood. She's frustrating, but I think I understand more than I did before about why."

"You were serious when you said you wanted to learn how to get along with her without losing your temper." She straightened her cowl-necked black shirt and smoothed the green skirt over her knees.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

Deanna gave him a dubious look. "What did you talk about with her this morning?"

It didn't pay to hedge or lie to her, and this was one of those subjects she would likely nail him to the floor on if he tried. But distraction was entirely possible. "Oh, nothing so unusual -- traditions and customs mostly, because of the Festival. I asked about the face-painting, and I was telling her about the quaint English custom of rolling wheels of cheese down a hill and chasing them -- "

"Cheese?" she blurted. "*Cheese?* I don't believe you! You told her that you chase cheese?"

"Not *me.* I'm French, remember? We do more sensible things, like grape-stomping and running the bulls, and -- "

"Grape stomping? Cheese chasing? What were you trying to do, outdo her at outrageousness?" She stared deep into his eyes. "You aren't making it up! Are you?"

"Deebird, don't be silly -- I wouldn't lie about anything so serious as *tradition.* I'll have you know that the people who participate in these festivals are very serious about continuing in the footsteps of their ancestors. Of course, we're fortunate that things like foot-binding, primogeniture -- "

"Primo. . . ."

"The practice of leaving the whole inheritance to the eldest son, regardless of how many children there are."

Deanna tilted her head, trying to sort through it. "What about the eldest daughter?"

"No. Just the son. Women couldn't own property."

"And you think Betazoid traditions are -- "

"I think that both Terran and Betazoid societies have come a long way from where they were -- don't you?"

She eyed him warily a moment longer, then deflated somewhat. "They have, for the most part. Let's see if Homn is back. Chandra will be expecting us soon."


	2. Chapter 2

  
\------------------------

"Here you go," Chandra said breezily, putting the cup on the patio table in front of Deanna. She sat across the round table and smiled, dimpling readily. "I suppose I can't blame him for being uneasy. It's too bad -- he didn't say much over lunch. I was hoping he'd be a little more comfortable than that."

"He really had something he wanted to do. It wasn't just discomfort -- he doesn't run from it that easily. You aren't the first woman who's ever thrown herself at him, you know."

"I wouldn't imagine so." Chandra hesitated, checking herself, then her smile waned. "You've been in the news."

Deanna smoothed the soft, thick skirt she wore and traced one of the designs on it. The bold black angular patterns against the dark green were eye-catching. "Have I?"

"The Houses still make the news. I have to wonder how they get the information they do. It was in the news when you married, and again when you changed careers. You're a first officer now?"

"Yes." Deanna smiled patiently at her friend. "It's a challenging position."

"And very unusual, for you, Dena. I don't see it. What happened to counseling?"

"I keep up with the field. I use those skills all the time -- it makes my job a little easier when it comes to dealing with the crew, especially when my husband's the captain."

Chandra watched her daughter, Shara, dig a hole in the middle of the pristine lawn covering her backyard. "Whatever happened to Will Riker?"

"He has his own ship, and a girlfriend." Deanna met her friend's dark eyes and saw reflections of the sun in them. "How did it happen? Halsan must have left quite suddenly. You said in your last message that things weren't quite what they should be, but nothing that hinted at complete dissolution."

"I don't know what happened. One minute things were being worked out, the next he decided it wasn't worth the effort." Chandra's mouth twisted. "I wonder what her name is?"

"You don't know that it was another woman, Dra."

"I suppose it could be a man." It was a poor attempt at levity. She tapped her long fingernails along her cheek rhythmically while resting her chin in her palm. "I would much rather hear about you and your captain. What's he like? I didn't expect him to be so old."

"He's not so old. You can see what he's like. I don't see why I have to say anything -- if I hadn't gotten there when I had, you probably would have sat in his lap."

"He didn't want anything to do with me and you know it. I was only trying to change his mind, mostly for the challenge of it. What's your mother think?"

Deanna sipped her ebi'lan and patted Yves, who had taken up fencing, judging from the series of soft pokes he gave her. "I spent the morning trying to sleep while Mother and Jean-Luc argued -- they had a confrontation yesterday, too, and she embarrassed him when we arrived. They seemed to part on good terms this morning, but it could change at any time. I wish I understood why she behaves the way she does."

"Does she still not like the idea of your marrying him? Is she jealous?"

Deanna thought about Mwala's assumption of the same, and sighed. "I don't know. She's gotten so good over the years at blocking me out of parts of her that she doesn't want me to see. I spend most of my time with her anticipating what ridiculous thing she'll do next."

"But what can you do? Family. I wish my mother would learn a thing or two about blocking things from me. I hate knowing she thinks I'm silly for just letting go. But who wants a husband who doesn't want you?" She wiped her eye, lines of pain in her face. "Sorry. Hard to believe -- I had such high hopes this time."

"It takes two to make a relationship work," Deanna said. She watched Shara put the dirt back in the hole and start another one a few feet away, sitting in the grass and jabbing the large spoon in the ground. "Do the children miss him? There are support groups -- "

"We'll be all right. I already have Kelis in a group. I have an appointment next week -- I didn't want to see anyone, but I think I'm to a point where I have to, for the children's sake more than anything else. They don't deserve to have such a distracted mother. Shara's so young, she probably doesn't realize yet that he's gone."

"Children realize more than we think they do."

Chandra gave her one of those long looks that said she heard more than was said. "Have you counseled children who have lost a parent, or step-parent? I could use a little advice -- I doubt he'll be coming back to see either of them. They weren't his."

"It's been a long time, but I've dealt with it before. Starfleet can be that dangerous. There aren't many children aboard these days." Shara pitched a spoon of dirt with a wave of her arm, just to see how far it would fly. Deanna smiled at it. "Children are more resilient than parents give them credit for. One of my last patients was a young woman who lost her father to the Borg. She also had significant trauma in her early teens, at about Kelis' age, from which she's mostly recovered. She'll be a good captain some day. Counseling makes a difference. And your children have a good mother, and grandparents to back her up."

"And I suppose there's always the hope that he'll wake up and realize the kids loved him, too." Chandra's eyes fell to Deanna's belly, losing some of her broodiness. "It's pretty early in the relationship for kids, isn't it? Though hajira makes it certain he'll be around to help you -- you're so lucky."

"I know. I would have said the relationship wouldn't work, if I'd been on the outside looking in. But Jean-Luc is determined, and there aren't too many things in the universe that can keep him from something, once he's made up his mind." She chewed her lip thoughtfully. "And I was hopeless. He could ask me for any impossible thing, and I'd do it for him."

Chandra crossed her graceful long legs, her eyes full of pain though she did her best to smile and be happy for her friend. "I can see that. I've seen you giddy in love before. This one has a completely different feel to it. Although I guess it stands to reason, given you're hajira. I saw your cousins at the Skydome last night -- did they come meet him?"

Deanna pressed her lips together and turned to see what Shara was doing. A third hole was in progress, dirt flying in several directions. The little head of dark curls bent over the task at hand. "Mwala and Plitty came to the house earlier in the day. Jean-Luc likes them, and vice versa. I think Mother was nervous about his meeting them."

"Who was the third woman at Skydome? I don't remember her, but she was wearing the Fifth House purple."

"No one of consequence."

Chandra frowned. "You're lying, and that's the first time in years that you've tried."

"Walima was put out of the House a long time ago, by Mother." Deanna took another sip of her tea. "She shouldn't have been wearing the purple."

"You House types. All that tradition and keeping up appearances -- sorry."

Deanna sank back in her chair. "It's not anything I can change."

"I don't envy you. My mother tells me that when Lwaxana married a human it caused a rift in the Houses -- as if humans were poison or something."

"It's not that he was human, so much as he wasn't who my grandmother wanted her to marry. And I didn't marry my betrothed either, so more scandal."

"I thought Wyatt was the one who abandoned the ceremony."

"It doesn't matter. People believe what they will, Dra. You know that. I just can't wait to hear the whispering when we show up at the Festival."

"If you're so despondent about it, why go?" Chandra picked up their empty cups. Deanna watched her friend saunter into the house. Chandra didn't understand, she never had -- but that had been one of the reasons Deanna enjoyed her friendship. Nothing about her reminded Deanna of the House. Making friends with people who weren't involved with the House had taught her hard lessons about how differently the majority of the Betazoids were raised. Luckily her mother had never been adverse to her associating closely with a wide variety of people of different cultures and societal niches. Deanna had known children from other Houses who hadn't been allowed such freedom.

Shara carefully carried a spoon of dirt across the yard. Eyes huge in her pale heart-shaped face, she held up her prize for Deanna to see. Her soft curls gave her a cherubic appearance.

"How are you, Shara?" she asked softly.

"Fine," the little girl said, quiet and uncertain. Automatic. Like most children under five, she had few labels for what she felt.

"What color do you feel today?"

Shara put her spoon down on the pavement, then came to stand at Deanna's knee. "Color?"

"I'm feeling this color right now." Deanna pointed at the green in her skirt. "Cool and calm. Quiet. What color do you feel?"

Shara trotted for the house. Chandra passed her in the door, looking down with a little puzzlement, and brought their refilled drinks to the table. "Where is she going?"

"I think she's getting something."

"How can you tell?"

"I'm an empath. How soon you forget. I've never quite got to the point of turning it off completely, like telepaths can." She sipped ebi'lan and watched Chandra over the rim of the cup, which was a translucent pink -- one of the set Deanna had sent as a wedding present the second time around. Her eyes traveled to the house casually, and around the well-kept yard. "Are you going to stay here?"

"No. I can't." Chandra's low, husky response brought Deanna's eyes back to her face. The tears rolled slow, moistening her lower lashes before tumbling to her cheeks. "Too many memories. It's on the market as of tomorrow. My uncle has a rental up in Ladonna I'll be taking -- smaller, but with enough room for the kids. I hear they have good schools in Ladonna." Her voice cracked, as did her composure. The wide black eyes meeting Deanna's held deep, lingering loneliness, and the pain radiating from Chandra reminded Deanna of a night that seemed long ago, when she'd stared out a viewport until a man with four pips came in and gave her the gift of his heart.

Deanna put aside the cup and held out her arms, into which her friend leaned, her head on Deanna's shoulder. When Shara's high-pitched call interrupted, Chandra stopped sobbing and sat up again, wiping her face on her sleeves. Her little girl raced out, waving a piece of paper.

"This color," she exclaimed, holding it up to Deanna.

"This is how you feel?" Deanna couldn't say anything more once she'd turned the paper over. Shara had drawn the perfectly-circular face small children usually drew to represent a person. Dark blue circle, light blue hair, black eyes, and purple tears under straight eyelashes. Deanna ran a finger down one of the blue curls, obviously the attempt to accurately depict Shara's hair. The same blue as Deanna's pony.

"When is Daddy coming home?" Shara asked, in the breathy voice of a child who knew a question wouldn't be answered but had to ask it anyway.

As Deanna raised her eyes to Chandra's anguished face, Yves flipped and poked. "Shara, this is my son, Yves," Deanna said, putting a hand on her belly. "If you put your hand right here you can feel him kicking."

Letting herself become a hands-on distraction brought smiles back to their faces. Upon request, Shara took Deanna on a tour of her room, showing off toys while Chandra smiled and hovered in the background. Her daughter's apparent cheerfulness distracted Chandra, and her mood wavered only a little when her daughter explained the origins of toys given by her father and step-father.

When Deanna sensed Jean-Luc nearby, she excused herself and promised to call again soon. She left the mother and daughter waving from their front door, walked down the street, and found the car parked in what must have been the only available spot. As she approached the gleaming silver vehicle, the door slid open, then closed as she dropped into the front seat.

Jean-Luc smiled at her, but lost some of it as she smoothed her skirt over her legs. "Cygne?"

She tried to smile, failed miserably, touched his face, then the back of his head, smoothing her palm over his hair and down to conform to the base of his skull. Sliding across the seat to be closer, she put her arms around his neck and closed her eyes, chin resting on his shoulder. He returned the embrace, questioning but not voicing it yet. Strong, warm, reassuring -- he was so solid and real. Calm. That vibrant part of him telepaths and empaths could detect was her refuge, hers alone, by his choosing. Hajira.

"All that matters," she whispered, choking on it.

He moved, dislodging her, and took her head in his hands to look at her. "Does visiting her always do this to you?"

"No. Her second husband just moved out. I'm afraid it's too easy for me to be caught up in her melancholy at the moment. I love you, Jean-Luc. I don't want to lose you."

His expression softened, but one eyebrow quirked up. "As if there were any possibility of that. I will only go if you ask me to, Deanna."

"Good." She regained some of her composure, at least enough to smile through fleeting tears and see his eyes alight with his response. "What errand did you have to run?"

"Ah. Thought you'd never ask." Patting her shoulder, he leaned and stuck his hand in a bag on the floor of the car near his feet. "This is for you."

Deanna took the wrapped box, curious and surprised. "What's the occasion?"

"Does there have to be an occasion?"

She ran a pinky under the pale blue paper and it unfolded, exposing a box. Inside the box was a clear glass blossom, a myriad of pointed petals folding outward around tiny upright stamen in the center of the flower. The petals had a delicate pink tint, she realized, holding it up to catch sunlight. A Telistra blossom. She put it back in the soft packing material and set it aside carefully before throwing her arms around him again.

"It's beautiful. Thank you."

"Home? Or would you rather do more sightseeing?"

"It doesn't matter. As long as I'm with you, I don't care where we are."

He leaned, and she heard the tapping of his fingers on the controls. The car began to move, humming quietly. "Moody bird. I begin to wonder if I shouldn't take you back to the gig and leave. You've been melancholy this whole trip."

" It's so easy to forget Betazed and the House when I'm on the *Enterprise* -- I've had plenty of practice."

"Is this why you intended to simply follow me wherever I went, without a thought for Betazed? Because the House complicates things for you?"

Deanna sat up and glanced out the window. They were heading for her mother's house. "Do you know why Baymei has so many pictures of my family?"

Jean-Luc frowned. "Now that you mention it, that is rather odd."

"He's my uncle."

"Uncle. . . . Your mother's *brother?*"

"Half-brother. My grandmother married a widower who had a son. Baymei was twenty when Mother was born. Mother had another sibling, a sister, but she died."

Rubbing the back of his thumb along his upper lip, Jean-Luc leaned on the back of the seat, half-turned toward her. "Why do I get the feeling this is only going to get more complicated as we go along?"

"By House standards, Baymei's not related. He isn't a Troi. Baymo and I played together as children, but neither one of us thought of the other as a cousin. I found out about Baymei when I was in my late teens, when I asked Mother why she was so close to him."

Jean-Luc had that familiar curl to his lip. "That doesn't sound right to me. You can't even introduce him as an uncle?"

"It isn't technically correct to do so. We can't include him in House functions."

Her heart sank as he struggled with it. "He isn't a Troi, so he isn't a member of the family -- so unless I become a Troi, I'm not a member of the family, either. So how would you introduce me?"

"You're my husband. It's different."

"Yves?"

"That depends on what we want. He'll have duel citizenship, of course. Participation in the House would depend on whether or not he is recognized at Alipha." Deanna held the box with the glass flower in her lap, running a finger along the edge of a petal. "If he is recognized at Alipha he would be a Troi. He couldn't be recognized at Alipha until we're married."

"Until we're married by Betazoid tradition, you mean," he said flatly. "But for a child of ours to be recognized I wouldn't have to be recognized as well?"

"Correct."

"So by House standards, we aren't married. We would have to have a Betazoid wedding before our children would be recognized as members of the House, and they would have to come to Alipha to be recognized." Part of him participated in a twisted kind of amusement, while another part got angry. "So I'm not your husband -- does that make me a concubine? My children illegitimate?"

"No. Those are human ideas. You're my husband, just not. . . . There are two types of husband, by old House tradition, which is a holdover from common custom, remember. One type may hold property jointly with the wife and claim parenthood of -- "

"You are telling me that Yves would not be my son, he would be yours, exclusively, and I have no rights as -- "

"Jean-Luc, please, they aren't my rules -- and I'm trying to explain in human terms into the bargain. I told you I didn't like what the House represented. Other Betazoids don't make such distinctions. Married is married, regardless of how they do it, so long as the paperwork's filed." Deanna watched a familiar row of trees going by the window. They were almost home. "I resigned myself to the conflict long ago. There will be no resolution. House tradition is what it is, and we either follow it or not."

"Then how did your mother compromise with the Millers on the wedding ceremony?"

"Begrudgingly, with threat of criticism from other House members. Some traditions can be bent, but certain others cannot be broken. You and I had a Starfleet ceremony, which was nothing like a Betazoid ceremony. You remember what the Betazoid ceremony is like, don't you?" He must have acquainted himself with it at one point; he was to have performed one, after all.

"Vaguely." He glanced up as the car turned up the drive. "There's someone else here."

"Someone dropping Mother off, perhaps?" Her being home this early was unusual. Deanna had expected her to be out until late in the evening.

They left the car further down the drive, giving the visitor room to leave. Deanna closed the box to conceal the blossom. It might upset her mother if she saw something similar to what she had once given Ian. While walking up the drive past the bright green vehicle blocking most of the parking area, Jean-Luc slowed, and she half-turned, questioning.

"How long were you going to wait to tell me any of this?" he asked quietly. "I would have expected full disclosure, all things considered. Counselor Troi would have insisted on it."

She smiled sadly, looking down at the box. "I know better than to think any explanation could convey the absurdity that is the House system. Mother was raised to it by Betazoid parents. I was raised by Mother, whose rebellious insistence on marrying someone other than her parents chose for her set her apart from the beginning. And my experience with Walima soured any enthusiasm I might have had for tradition."

"You're saying that you have no interest in continuing your own heritage."

Deanna pressed her lips together and hesitated. "I'm saying that I knew I would have to choose, long ago -- remember the identities of some of my elephants? That should prove the decision predates you. Mother feels she can blithely court anyone in the quadrant without conflicts -- she has an heir. She expects me to provide the same. The Betazoid culture is not the problem. The House is. I wish there were some way it could be otherwise. I just don't see how it would work, I'm so afraid the children will be caught in the same -- "

"Stop," he exclaimed, reaching for her and asserting his calm and warmth. His thumb across her cheek wiped the few tears away. "Look at me and tell me what you want."

She met his gaze and smiled, hands wrapped around the box. "What I want right now?"

"It would be a start, I suppose." His half-smile said he wasn't sure what she was up to.

"I want to sneak in the back way. I want to take off that jacket, and the shirt, and run my hands over your chest -- "

"You don't think your mother will leave us alone for long, certainly."

Deanna looked at the house. A familiar, high-pitched laugh came faintly to them. She sensed a familiar collection of individuals, and turned back to Jean-Luc with eyebrows high.

"Mother's busy with friends. They may know we're here, but I don't think they'll bother us. So why don't we go in the back window so we don't interrupt and meditate for a while? We haven't worked on our exercises in a few days."

\------------------------

When Jean-Luc opened his eyes again, he had to blink away disorientation. Spending long periods of time in whatever trance their mental exercises created had that effect. Deanna sat cross-legged in front of him, hands in her lap and eyes still closed. She'd pulled off the green and black skirt and wore only the baggy black shirt, the sleeves rolled up to her elbows.

He uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, sitting on his knees. Her silent laughter as his lips met the soft skin of her throat just beneath her jaw told him she had known exactly what he was up to, though he'd been careful not to otherwise disturb her.

"Hello, handsome fish," she murmured. "Help me up?"

He stood, feeling a little stiff, and took her hand to help her up from the floor. His hand went to Yves out of habit. "Petite mere."

"I think we're making progress. How did it seem to you this time?"

"I still have trouble making sense of some of it. A lack of the proper kinds of neurons, no doubt." He noted with satisfaction that the melancholy was gone. Visiting Chandra had filled her eyes with such sadness.

"I suppose we should put in an appearance." Deanna turned away to sort through her clothes in the closet, taking too much time selecting something from the few outfits she'd brought.

"Deebird?"

She considered a blue tunic. "Jean-Luc?"

"Talk to me. Don't isolate yourself this way."

"What do you mean?" Deanna hung the tunic and pulled out a plain off-white sarong.

"We just spent nearly an hour working through a bonding exercise, yet you managed to leave me feeling as though we hadn't completely connected."

Pulling the shirt off over her head, she dropped it on the floor and wrapped herself in the sarong. "I'm feeling off. I'm not comfortable here, for some reason. I've been trying to put a label on it and I can't. I've never felt this way before when I've come to see Mother in the past. I thought perhaps it had something to do with the memories stirred by being at the House, but it's not that."

"Should you see a doctor? It might be wise."

She turned from the closet, holding out her hands, and he took them as she came to him. "It isn't a physiological problem. If we were on the ship, I'd want to investigate, check long range sensors -- I feel a vague sense of something being amiss. It isn't Mother, though she's been too excitable and you've clashed with her a few times. I feel itchy, just like yesterday morning. Restless."

"But you're not nauseated or over-sensitive? Is this something I could help you compensate for?"

"You're already helping. You helped me recover from being with Chandra." Her belly bumped him, keeping them apart. She winced. "I love our son, but I wish I could hug you without leaning."

"Guess you'll have to get used to being held from behind."

Sensing the emotion he didn't express in his words brought laughter to her dark eyes. "Remove you from the ship and suddenly every other thought turns lascivious."

Jean-Luc pulled on her left hand until she stood shoulder against his chest. An arm across her back and a hand to her face, he kissed her gently on the lips, then angled his head to bury his face in her hair and nuzzle the back of her neck. It made her shiver.

{Do you know what that means, to touch that way?}

{You like to touch me that way, so I thought I would reciprocate. Does it mean something?}

{It depends on context -- to touch a lover there is one of the most intimate gestures a Betazoid can make. Especially if one reaches out mentally as well, which often happens.}

"Do you touch me telepathically whenever you do that?" he asked, raising his head to look her in the eye. She smiled and studied him through her long lashes.

"Usually. I'm a little surprised you haven't noticed by now."

"I might now that I know to pay attention -- but it seems out of character for you. Making telepathic contact without permission is something I would accuse your mother of doing."

"There are degrees of contact. I do it differently now than I did the first time. If I were to use the metaphor of touch to describe it, that first time would be like this." She ran a finger over his eye, along the brow and down the side of his face.

"And how do you describe it now?"

Her mouth closed on his, her tongue played along his, and then she was gone too soon. He laughed, pursuing further contact, but she pulled away from him and re-tied the sarong he'd just undone. "Horny fish."

"You shouldn't tease me that way."

"I wasn't teasing, I was demonstrating as requested. Stop that." She fought with his fingers at the knot on her left hip. "Jean-Luc!"

"It's your fault. What are you going to do about it?"

"You're getting noisy, and there are telepaths in the house."

He stopped short of trapping her against the wall. "What?"

"I wasn't going to say anything because I didn't want to make you feel too self-conscious. But our first night here, when I created that feedback loop, it got. . . loud. I suspect it's because you're human and you don't have complete control."

"You mean someone -- you mean your mother *listened* to -- "

"Jean-Luc, she didn't try to, she was asleep," Deanna exclaimed, catching his arm before he could stalk off to pace the room. "It woke her up. I don't think she eavesdropped again, either. And she didn't say anything to you, did she?"

"You didn't tell me about it. You would have let -- " He cut himself short and mastered his anger, smoothing his hand over his head. "You didn't let it happen again. Thank you."

"I'm sorry." She ran a hand down the front of his shirt, looking mournful. "It's nice not to have the possibility of a red alert or some other duty-oriented interruption, but I didn't feel right about pretending we had privacy when it's likely we would've gotten their attention."

"You said it was noisy when you created the feedback loop -- not before?"

"They're awake. It wouldn't take as much to get their attention."

He took another step, backing her against the wall near the closet door. "It was heart fire that caused it, and since you're the Betazoid in the equation, it was probably mostly your fault. Would the same thing happen if you happened to be under the influence of an inhibitor?"

Deanna laughed breathlessly, wide-eyed, tilting her head as he leaned in to kiss her. "Don't you even care?"

"Your mother shut out the light when I stopped caring last night. She doesn't want to know."

It won him her complete distraction from what he was doing. Shoving him away, she met his eyes, startled. "You're psychoanalyzing my mother. Or trying to."

"I only want to understand -- "

"All that nonsense this morning about cheese-chasing -- you were trying to beat her at her own game. I wondered what all those emotions were about. Jean-Luc, you can't think you can outdo my Mother at outrageous behavior! You're asking for whatever she does to retaliate!"

He'd hoped she had slept through all that and not sensed any of it. In vain, apparently. "I am only trying to establish some sort of cordial relationship with my mother-in-law. You thought it was a good idea."

"I thought it was a good idea for you to try being friendly and more tolerant of her antics. You can't manipulate her, Jean-Luc, you just can't. She'll figure it out and get angry. And you've never seen her really angry, believe me." Deanna re-tied her sarong as she spoke.

"I've seen her angry over Timicin, remember?"

"That was outrage of a different nature. And you married her daughter -- if she assumes you manipulate me that way, too, you're going to get a taste of what she gave Walima. You can't even imagine what she's like when she thinks I'm in danger of being hurt by someone that way. Just stop while you're ahead, please?" Her voice lost all volume and turned to a whispered plea.

Jean-Luc reached for her again, trying to comfort this time, and realized she'd gone stiff. "I won't do anything to provoke her. Relax, Deebird, everything will be all right. We just have to get through the Festival tomorrow, and we can be on our way to more sightseeing, and leave your mother here. Oui?"

"I hope it's that simple," she mumbled, tugging the front of his shirt. "Between you and my mother, I have the feeling the odds are against it."

\--------------------------

Deanna counted herself lucky that she'd only had to nudge him awake four times. Six hours of pomp and circumstance at the Fifth House weren't what he'd imagined, she was certain. She had told him it would be that long, but not that boring.

Raynma was nearing the end of the last dramatic presentation. The dining hall had been one of the rooms they hadn't seen, being late to the tour, and at first Jean-Luc had studied his surroundings with interest. The windows were pretty enough, intricate designs depicting scenes from history -- he'd silently asked questions until she told him they could be overheard too easily.

Unlike day-to-day protocol, there were telepaths being telepaths here. She could 'hear' part of what went on behind the spoken words; in addition to the monologue, the presenters broadcasted a handed-down memory of the people described. But the fragments she received were of little use, and she usually tuned most of the telepathic portion out. Jean-Luc heard none of it, of course, which was why she couldn't blame him for falling asleep.

The long oval table, set on one side for a dinner that would shortly be served, faced the inner wall, which had been draped in white curtains covering the mural painted there. Against that backdrop stood Raynma of the Second House, a tall woman seeming taller in her shimmering gold dress with a high-collared cape. It seemed the style of the season; most of the House ladies were wearing something similar in their House colors. Raynma also had painted her face, as everyone attending had, with symbols that meant something to the person. She'd chosen to put ula flowers on her cheeks, pink and green, with gold glitter in the paint.

Deanna kept her serene public smile, but if she relaxed it, she felt the tug of the paint on her own cheeks. She glanced at Jean-Luc, sitting stiffly in his dress uniform with his polite-in-the-name-of-diplomacy demeanor; he'd chosen gold paint to match the trim on his uniform, and decorated his face with tiny stars barely a millimeter across. No one here would recognize the constellation Pisces on his right cheek, or the constellation Cygnus on his left -- the most likely assumption would be stars because of his affiliation with Starfleet.

Much more subtle than the Telistra blossom Deanna had fashioned on her own cheek, copying the glass flower he'd given her. She glanced down at the five-months bump in her dress. Mother had chosen this getup to match her own. Deanna hated it -- she looked like a glittery drinking straw with a grape stuck in it, with wispy coils of wire dangling from her shoulders. The fabric was the color of Chateau Picard Burgundy -- that was all it had going for it.

Raynma finished her droning recitation of the generations of her House, left the floor in a dramatic sweep of golden cape, and Lana of the First House rose, gesturing with her hand toward Raynma and bestowing a supercilious smile on her. The two were rivals of long standing. One wouldn't know it to see them here, other than the forced pleasantness.

Lana spoke in Betazoid, then waved her hands in dismissal. The House ladies rose en masse, followed shortly by their attending family members, and Deanna jogged her husband's arm gently as she stood.

He fairly popped up out of his chair, eager to do anything but sit. "What was that?" he whispered. Obviously, he'd nodded off again. Or perhaps the translator hadn't known what to do with that dialect. The First House Daughters actually went so far as to speak in archaic Betazoid.

"Social time announcement. Then dinner in an hour." {Walk that way, I need to stretch my legs.} She glanced at her mother -- as she was hostess, she'd immediately flitted off to speak in cooing tones to her fellow matriarchs, nearly striking with a gesturing arm one of the new initiates to the Fourth House, a six-year-old girl in a simple white robe.

There were only two initiates this time, and both in the same house. Deanna had vague memories of her own experience. She remembered being afraid of Lana, so large to her six-year-old perception -- it'd been the first time she had ever seen the woman. Her cold hands had gripped Deanna's head for the duration of the induction ritual. The sharpness of her intrusion on Deanna's thoughts had been so unlike the affectionate contacts she had had with her mother that she'd cried out, then bit back her reaction. The scorn from the House ladies had been evident on their faces -- such an undisciplined child. She remembered returning to her seat and her father's hand on her shoulder; she hadn't been able to look at him, or anyone else.

Deanna watched the girl duck around Lwaxana. She and her sister continued to follow their mother, Diwa, whose atrocious wide collar nearly took down the carefully-pinned hair of Lana, and for a moment it seemed their might be war between the First House and the Fourth, the shorter woman in spangled white and the taller in shocking electric green staring each other down, but it was resolved in a moment and the two parted ways, Diwa's twin girls pattering along like obedient baby birds behind her.

Mwala and Plitty lingered, sitting in their places to the right of Mother's chair, trying to disentangle from each other -- they too wore the nuisance grape-hued spring-covered dresses her mother had chosen, and Plitty had probably fallen asleep leaning on her sister and gotten her springs tangled. Since they were thus occupied, Deanna turned to follow her husband in the direction she'd indicated, the door that would take them outside. She needed fresh air desperately.

Jean-Luc didn't get far. "Captain Picard," Ehoi cried, gesturing broadly with an open hand. They'd met everyone earlier; Ehoi was a brother of Zela of the Sixth House. Accordingly, he wore a bright red pantsuit, no glitter. "Won't you join us for a traditional game of El'afian?"

The lover's search -- a game that Betazoids who were unattached played, involving blindfolds and stumbling through a group of people hunting for compatible partners using only the sense of the other person. In her explanations to Jean-Luc she'd overlooked this; she usually endured the dull conversation indoors than participate.

Since by House standards she and Jean-Luc were unattached by any formal bond, Ehoi asked. A veiled slight. Normally the younger members were less strict about such nuances of tradition. Lwaxana must have squabbled with Zela again. Deanna was about to refuse, but heard her mother distantly: "Oh, you'll just *love* him! My daughter has such good taste in -- "

"We'd love to," Deanna said, smiling at Ehoi. She grabbed Jean-Luc's arm and followed the grinning younger man, noting with wry amusement that Ehoi's hair was longer than hers, and even more curly. He'd dyed it red, trying to match his House color. She wondered if his lips got chapped kissing Zela's duranium nether regions -- the woman was on her second husband, who Deanna had not seen at the table. Not showing up at the Festival was generally the first sign of husband on the way out; the second sign was the way Zela had vanished immediately upon the conclusion of the litanies, to avoid questions. Ehoi would be lobbying for his daughter becoming Zela's heir since she had no children of her own.

She hated the damned House system. Starfleet Bureaucracy at least had a *purpose* beyond wreaking havoc on the lives of families.

They emerged from the door at the end of the dining room on a lawn. "What are we doing?" Jean-Luc murmured.

"We are participating. Just like Mother wants. It won't be a problem, you'll see. Better the game than having Mother show you off."

"What is El'afian?"

Stick to the essentials, the now, and don't tell him the historical significance, she thought. Get through this with minimal suffering. The alternative was to face the more apparent disdain of the older House ladies. "They blindfold one person and send him through a crowd of people. It's a matchmaking game. You find a compatible partner using your sense of them."

"But I don't want a -- "

"They know better than to think it would be a permanent match. It's just the premise of the game, Jean, it's not something they take seriously, any more than you would marry the first girl you kissed playing spin the bottle. Unless you'd rather go back inside and let Mother show you off?"

He sighed and looked around. The circular expanse of grass, bordered by statuary and hedge, was swiftly being populated by Betazoids. "Am I the only human here? To think your mother actually asked me if I really wanted to come -- " He smirked, shaking his head. "Fish out of water, and somewhere in the Sahara. I should have listened to you, Deebird."

"You're the only hajira here, if that helps."

Ehoi seemed to have been elected game director. As Betazoids of all ages milled around talking and giggling, Ehoi clapped his hands and held up the blindfold, a black strip of material long enough to wrap around someone's head twice. People fell silent and looked around, many eyes falling on Deanna and Jean-Luc. She knew they were conversing telepathically; it tickled on the periphery of her senses. Frustrating that she couldn't hear them, but it wasn't difficult to know what they were up to.

"They want you to go first. It's because they're curious about hajira," she muttered, smiling. "They want to see if you'll be able to even participate."

His dislike for becoming the center of attention reasserted itself. People had stared when they arrived, now this. But to her surprise, when Ehoi came over, Jean-Luc accepted the blindfold without protest. "Do you understand how to play?" Ehoi asked.

"Stumble around blindfolded until I find someone compatible? It's a matchmaking game, Deanna said."

"You seek mind to mind, until you find someone who feels right. You take the person's hand, then remove the blindfold and kiss. On the cheek if you want. Nothing embarrassing."

"That's all?"

"Unless you want more than a kiss," a woman in Third House blue purred. Several others standing with her laughed and exchanged wily glances.

Deanna sensed the mood -- the interest in Jean-Luc went further than idle curiosity, in some cases. This felt like a hazing. It probably was. Competition between the Houses took subtle forms.

She watched Ehoi wrap the blindfold around Jean-Luc's head and tie it, then take the captain's arm and walk him in a circle around the perimeter of the lawn. Deanna smiled and milled about with the other participants. They would be surprised. The abilities of 'normal' Betazoid hajira didn't include awareness of one another's physical proximity. That was something unique to herself and Jean-Luc, so far as she knew.

When Ehoi let him go, Jean-Luc stood still as if getting his bearings. The crowd, now twenty-two people strong, tensed. Deanna stood almost directly across the lawn from him, but there were a lot of bodies between them. He took a step, paused, dodged around a woman standing close to him, and made similar progress until he'd zigzagged roughly half the distance toward his wife, leaving a trail of surprised people in his wake.

Deanna sensed a commotion of surprise and glanced at the door -- her mother and a few of her peers were watching. Lwaxana beamed and waved; Deanna smiled faintly and then, as Jean-Luc came almost within arm's reach, evaded him.

She wasn't supposed to, once the search had begun. She wove through the other participants and he changed direction to compensate. This was like the Romulan dancing they had done, the coordination taking place on an almost-subconscious level and further enhanced thanks to their bonding efforts. She closed her eyes and slowed her pace. Focusing inward, pulling herself in and drawing him toward her, she began to dance.

Let them move out of her way! Raising her arms, she performed a sedate series of steps and turns, drawing on her dancing lessons of months ago when they'd prepared for that undercover mission. Puckish curiosity rapidly turned to surprise around her. Spin on the balls of her feet, arms out, folding them across her chest as she completed a second turn -- there he was. They stood a moment, inches apart, and then she sensed his awareness and the mirror of her impulse. The recognition of what she was doing.

{Keep dancing. Turn their hazing on them.} He'd recognized that, too. It had been fairly obvious in their facial expressions, she supposed.

The pull of hajira between them like a cushion, she extended an arm over her head and moved left, knowing he mirrored the movement precisely. The ties were there.

The longer they danced slowly around the lawn, the less she sensed. The effort of continuing and escalating their dance to more impressive maneuvers took more of her attention. She feinted closer, coming so close one of the braids on his uniform brushed her cheek, and ducked under his right arm to stand back to back, then pivoted on a toe and followed his lead. He changed direction when her foot slipped off the edge of the grass into the moist soil of the flower bed closest to the House.

They halted at last. She opened her eyes, taking in the staring crowd that had gathered in addition to the other game participants, and smiled contentedly. "I'm thirsty," she said, turning to head for the door. Jean-Luc followed her, taking subliminal instructions and sticking close enough to avoid the same obstacles she did; they were walking too close, should have tripped over each other's feet, but he even navigated the steps without removing the blindfold.

She sensed the turmoil of confused Betazoids, heard the verbal conversations beginning behind them, and winked at her mother before passing through the door into the dining hall.

Finally, she could get back at them for all the years of telepathic conversations carried on around her. Petty, yes. Childish. Completely beneath her. But satisfying, nevertheless, that the entire herd of House aristocrats, including and especially the ones who slighted her in so many small ways for being less than telepathic, had just watched her do something they *couldn't* do.

{You're being smug.}

{Absolutely. Thank you, Jean. That was fun. They tease, they haze, and you turned it on them.}

{And you one-upped me by thinking of dancing. Is it just my limited perception at work, or are they less than approving of you and your mother?}

{Not in a straightforward way.}

She could sense him thinking hard, as they crossed the dining room and maneuvered through the maze of the first floor of the Fifth House, leaving shocked silence in their wake -- he still wore the blindfold and followed hard on her heels.

{Are you going to take it off?}

{I can't confront them, I'll bemuse them. If you'll cooperate?}

{I don't know, I did want a kiss. . . .}

"Deanna!"

She stopped in the hall as a slender woman in green emerged from a side corridor. Diwa's sister, Redal. Not an unfriendly person. Deanna smiled.

"Hello, Redal. You met my husband earlier?"

"Yes," Redal said slowly, confused. "You were playing el'afian?"

"We were. I'm glad to see you here."

Redal's knowing look and conspiratorial smile said she knew why. "It's worse this year," she whispered. "Because you married. Diwa feels badly for you, Deanna, and so do I."

"I can't do anything about what people think. I can only control my reaction to it."

"Ever the counselor." Redal smiled sadly. "Diwa took your advice. She's sending her girls to the public school instead of hiring a private tutor. Lana isn't speaking to her now."

"Somehow I think that isn't so much of a loss."

"That's what Diwa said. Is something wrong? I thought your mother would be ecstatic about the baby -- congratulations, by the way, on so many things. I had no idea you were hajira. What a lucky baby to have dedicated parents. I'm sure it made the difference for you, as it did for Diwa and myself."

"The difference." Deanna suddenly felt like crying again.

Redal was looking back down the corridor behind her, and didn't see the expression on Deanna's face. "It's too bad we have to be exceptions to the normal House family tradition. The other Houses wouldn't know love or trust if it landed on their laps. Lana especially, I don't think the woman has such things in her vocabulary."

"Mother is probably feeling stressed about the Festival. She's disappointed with the caterers. I heard her chiding them about the oskoid before the litanies."

"I don't think she needs to worry. This is better than last year -- Zela had tantrums about the way her new draperies looked and she had no time to replace them. Her mood set off a chain of reactions that ended with everyone not speaking to each other for a month afterward. At least your mother is pleasant in spite of everything, even if she does seem flighty." Redal sighed. "I'm sorry, Captain, I don't mean to ignore you. Why are you still blindfolded?"

"There are advantages to being in the dark."

Deanna smiled and rolled her eyes at Redal's amusement. "Excuse us, Redal. We'll talk again later."

Jean-Luc's hand felt heavy against her back as they walked toward the kitchens. He was too quiet. She could sense his growing ire, and the concern and frustration he felt on her behalf.

The temptation to go out the back door and keep walking as far and as fast as possible from the Fifth House was too great, at that moment. When she was ten she had done exactly that, and spent the evening building a tree house with Baymei and Baymo. Her mother had been furious at first, but forgave her quickly enough.

But Jean-Luc wanted to be there, to see what it was about, so she went for a tall glass of ebi'lan, then led him back to the dining hall for more forced conversation. He reluctantly removed the blindfold on the way back.

~^~^~^~^~

At least with the blindfold on he didn't have to see the measuring looks, the slyness of someone who had an advantage and knew it. He'd never met Betazoids like these. Deanna had said the Houses were different -- even so, he hadn't imagined such smugness and at times disdain from them.

That was the trouble with stereotyping, he supposed. Label the Betazoid culture as peaceful and serene and overlook the fact that individuals tended to pay no attention to labels.

It wasn't him they disdained, either, it was the Fifth House, Lwaxana and her eccentricities, and her daughter the Starfleet officer who hadn't married her bonded fiance. Deanna seemed an oddity to the older women especially. Evidently, pursuing a career as dangerous as being on a starship translated to them as abandoning House tradition completely. He'd heard comments that told him as much. Hearing disdain for the woman who had become an officer worthy of every commendation she'd earned made him angry. Hearing her Starfleet career become part of the reason for the disdain made him angrier. The only ones who seemed even half-normal were Diwa and her relations in the Fourth House. He should count his blessings, he supposed. Lwaxana's harmless affectations and fluttery nonsense may be annoying, but better to have a butterfly for a mother-in-law than a viper like the rest of them.

He pulled out Deanna's chair for her as they sat down to dinner. She gave him a fond look and touched the back of his neck lightly before turning to the plate one of the caterers placed before her.

Dinner lasted forever. Everything lasted forever, Jean-Luc thought -- getting ready for the festival, the long recitations earlier, the dinner -- probably the festivities afterward would last twice as long. And it was misnamed; this wasn't a festival, it was a chance for a bunch of arrogant women to show off their ability to remember the names and exploits of their ancestors and posture at each other. Come to think of it, the whole scenario reminded him of why he hated those admiralty dinners so much. Only here the ratio of men to women skewed the opposite direction, and the exploits were of an incredibly pedestrian and incomprehensible nature. Never had it been so clear that he'd married a non-human -- without a doubt, his own upbringing had been completely unlike Deanna's.

By the time the attendees filed from the room on the way to the other half of the Festival -- half being a sobering recognition of the hours he had left to endure -- he was ready to snap at Lwaxana to shut up. She had kept up a long, loud conversation with the person seated to Plitty's right, a woman from the Fourth House, about how difficult it was to keep up such large houses. As if she personally had anything to do with it.

Deanna rose, always a few seconds after her mother did, Jean-Luc noted. Another irritation. All of them fell into rank and file behind their House matriarchs, walking behind them, daughters before the husbands -- was it any wonder there were only two husbands actually present?

Jean-Luc stood and steadied Deanna as she swayed; she smiled weakly at him in thanks, and turned to follow Lwaxana, stopping as her mother stood giving instructions to Mwala to carry a message to the caterer regarding the after-dinner drinks and asked Plitty to run some other errand. Jean-Luc took note of the droop of his wife's shoulders. His little bird seemed to be wilting. He slid a hand from her shoulder to the small of her back to get her attention and leaned to speak in her ear.

"I think you should rest."

Deanna's head turned and her lips parted, but Lwaxana whirled and took her arm before she could say anything. "Come along, dear, and help me serve the -- "

"No."

Jean-Luc's soft but firm interruption startled her. Lwaxana put her hands on her hips, the many dangling, sparkling coils suspended from her dress bouncing. "Tradition -- "

"She's tired. You can't expect her to last another ten hours without rest." He did his best to keep the ire he felt out of his voice.

Lwaxana dropped her arms and turned to Deanna, softening as she did so. "How do you feel, dear?"

"I think something I ate disagreed with me," Deanna murmured.

"Oh, well. You go on up to the rooms and lie down, then. You'll take care of her, won't you, dear?" Lwaxana looked at Jean-Luc.

"Of course," he said, not adding 'and don't call me dear' but implying it with a look.

"Please come find me if. . . Deanna, are you sure you're all right?"

"I'll be all right."

With a final doubtful glance at Jean-Luc, Lwaxana ran a hand down her daughter's arm and fluttered off after her retreating guests.

Jean-Luc took Deanna upstairs, ignoring looks from scattered groups talking in the hall. The further they got from the crowds, the better he felt. In the quiet of the plain little apartment he let out a sigh as the door slid shut behind them. The lights had come on automatically when the door opened.

"This is ridiculous," he exclaimed, taking off his jacket. "Absolutely ludicrous! Are you all right?"

Deanna stood with her arms crossed over Yves, her back turned to him. Draping his jacket over his arm, he took two steps and put an arm around her. Easy to kiss the back of her neck with her hair piled on top of her head this way.

"I need air," she said breathlessly.

They entered the same bedroom they'd been in before, and after seeing her seated on the bed, he opened the window. Dusk had come and gone; it was dark outside now. A light breeze swept into the room. She closed her eyes as it touched her face, and the few loose curls swayed gently along her cheeks. He came to kneel before her, taking her hands in his, and when she opened her eyes they were filled with a quiet pathos, even though she smiled at him fondly.

"I'm sorry, but I did try to warn you. It's almost as boring as the diplomatic mission to the Kandrids, isn't it?"

He smiled a little at the memory. "How many times did you kick Will to wake him up that afternoon?"

"I lost count. Nearly as many times as I had to kick you."

"Well, now I know where you developed the ability to stay awake through the most tedious of speeches. You must have come to too many of these Festivals." He frowned, suddenly suspicious, and eyed her. "Wait a minute."

"I don't *pretend* interest in your speeches, silly fish." She leaned and kissed his forehead. "At least, not often."

He sighed and accepted the tease with a wry smile. Patting Yves, he leaned close. "You'll have to excuse her, she likes to laugh at your papa sometimes. Don't pay it any mind."

"Jean."

He got lost in her eyes as they met his. She could melt him with a look like that. Coming up off the floor, he sat beside her without breaking eye contact and kissed her cheek reverently. She accepted it then put her head on his shoulder. They swayed a few moments, arms going about one another. Sitting quietly cheek to cheek, listening to the sigh of the breeze and the creak of night insects, he remembered.

"What are you thinking?" she whispered as if afraid to interrupt.

"Why don't you come with me and find out?"

She smiled -- though he couldn't see it, he could feel it in the twitch of her cheek against his and in that empathic way he could only manage when she had opened herself to him. The twisting, falling sensation began. He reached for it, doing the mental equivalent of a nose dive, and then they were in the nebulous recreation of a memory -- they'd gotten much better at it since their first attempt.

/// The guests hurried for their seats as the music started. And there came Kenny and Sarah. The ten-year-old girl flung flower petals and kept her head bowed shyly, hurrying to sit with her parents as she reached the front. Kenny did his goose-stepping march right up to the groom, bared his teeth, and growled. Loudly.

Jean-Luc watched the little boy hand off the pillow to Data, then race to his mother. The first few rows of guests were trying not to laugh and failing miserably. What was the kid thinking? Had he seen Worf and decided to play Klingon in the middle of the wedding?

"Here we go," Will muttered. Once he looked up from Kenny, Jean-Luc didn't spare anyone or anything another thought. Beverly stood on the front porch of the chateau, looking radiant -- the bright spring sun turning her hair to flame, the smile she bestowed upon her 'friend' Tom Glendenning sitting in the third row as she sedately followed in the wake of the ring bearer -- he couldn't remember the last time he'd seen her glow that way. Jean-Luc had a good feeling about it. Tom had turned out to be a decent fellow.

And then he heard Will inhale sharply. Heads turned, people were rising -- Deanna had come out. Barefoot, the bouquet of red roses in hand, color in her cheeks and a brilliance in her eyes, her smile eloquent though the corners of her mouth hardly moved. The off-white, off-the-shoulder dress did nothing to distract one from the beauty of the wearer, which was as it should be. A wreath of flowers in her hair, which was tied back simply and lay across her shoulders. Her progress down the aisle was obscured by standing guests, but she rounded the corner at last and glided toward the wedding party.

She came to stand before him, not looking at him, hiding her eyes behind her lashes -- a good thing. If she had met his eyes then he probably would have forgotten where they were and who was watching and done something embarrassing.

She was beautiful. He lost himself in the wonder of it all; the ceremony could have been happening to someone else, though he roused himself to make the appropriate responses. The only person in the room who really mattered finally raised her eyes to his as the pronouncement was made, and the realization overwhelmed him.

It was real. They were married. He hadn't thought it would make much difference, a mere formality, a public acknowledgment of something he already knew would be permanent. But it made a difference. His wife, who would stay at his side no matter what.

The pull, inevitable and inescapable, drawing him into her eyes, bringing them together -- there would be time later for passion. This was forever, compressed into a moment's touch, with the smell of her perfume and the warmth of her hands on his arms. This soft, solid presence, this goddess in peasant's clothing, was his wife.

There would never be poetry to express this. Words meant nothing. The only way to express this would be following through with the promises he made, those cliched vows so few people seemed able to keep.

If their time together so far were any indicator, he would have no difficulty doing just that. ///

He opened his eyes to the bedroom in the Fifth House, to see a leaf flutter to the floor, brought in by a gust of wind. Another gust, and the pane banged, swinging loosely; petals and more leaves swept in. Deanna's arms tightened around his ribs. Her head on his shoulder, she seemed determined to keep him there. He didn't mind wearing her like a second skin, regardless of the way those coils of wire were poking him.

"I don't want to go back downstairs," she whispered. "I don't want to be stared at any more. I'm tired of being talked about as if I'm some sort of traitor. I wish. . . I wish I had spoken to Walima at the restaurant, when we saw her. I just want a family -- why can't I have the family I want? They're all such hateful people!"

His answer was forgotten at the sound of a faint intake of breath that wasn't Deanna's. He barely heard it over her wavering, fighting-the-tears sigh. He looked over his shoulder, trying not to be obvious about it. Lwaxana hovered in the hall -- he could see the glimmer of purple. She'd been concerned, it made sense that she would come up to check on her daughter. Rather than suggest leaving, as he wanted more than anything, he acknowledged the situation for what it was.

"Is that what you really want, Deebird?" he asked quietly. "To let them drive you away?"

Her arms loosened. "Is it worth fighting them?"

"They should learn that pride belongs in how far we've come from where we were -- remembering history is important. But preserving it doesn't have to consume us to the point that we sacrifice our happiness to it -- they miss so much by chaining themselves to the past. How are they supposed to understand that unless someone provides a good example?"

She was recovering quickly and laughing softly at him. "Everything turns into an away mission with you. It's a good thing I enjoy our adventures together, even if it does entail the occasional uncomfortable situation."

"How do you feel? Still queasy?"

"The fresh air and putting some distance between ourselves and the crowd helped a lot."

"Good." He pulled at one of the coils, pressing it back into shape with finger and thumb. "The Festival of Alipha seems mostly benign, except for the minor displays of snobbery. If we came again, do you suppose we would be as much of a curiosity the second time?"

She released him, shivering at another gust of wind, and while she bent her curlicues back into spirals he shut the window. "Possibly not. It depends on whether Shivira actually marries that little fellow with the kinky blond hair. That might cause enough gossip to take everyone's attention off us. Did you see him?"

"Did he pay any attention to you?"

"No."

"Then I didn't see him." He grinned, holding out a hand. She took it and let him help her up. "Have I told you how exquisite you look tonight?"

"No, because I don't. This isn't my color and I look like I swallowed a shuttlecraft."

"You *feel* like you did, which is not the same at all, trust me."

She faked a pout, complete with protruding lower lip. "I look fat."

"You're just pregnant. I'm getting fat." He pulled on the jacket again.

"You? Where are you putting it, your feet?" She fastened his jacket as he straightened it. "This is the same old jacket and it fits just fine."

"It's tight. The whole uniform is -- the damned collar is too -- "

"You complain about the collar every time you wear this, stop fiddling with it." She slapped his fingers out of her way and tugged at it. "Where is your fourth pip? You've demoted yourself."

"I don't know. Perhaps it fell off when we were playing that game -- some of those women got in my way on purpose. And what was that about? Let me guess, eons ago that was how they paired off the spare single people?"

"Close. How did humans manage it?"

"That would depend on which culture you pick -- in some countries they actually sold the girls. In others the match was made after considering the quality of the family she would marry into. These things don't want to go back the way they were," he said, trying to re-form another spring hanging from her right shoulder.

"How did the French manage?"

"The common folk paid more attention to individual preference. Aristocrats tended to arrange things for political benefit and then take mistresses."

"Mistresses."

"I'm speaking historically, cygne. The only mistress I have is at the starbase getting sensor upgrades."

"I'm wondering if I'll find that pip somewhere it shouldn't be. After that Deltan woman tried to -- "

"Dee, stop it," he exclaimed, giving her a gentle shake by the shoulders. "I don't like being teased about that. You do know better."

"Yes. I'm trying not to think about going downstairs -- we should. I know that. We can't abandon Mother."

He'd thought she must sense Lwaxana was there in the hall, but perhaps not. "Why did you think I insisted on coming at all? I told her I wasn't trying to steal you away from her but I don't think she believed me. I didn't mean to disturb you the other morning, I was only trying to talk to her -- I don't understand why she won't. I can't help wondering if she just doesn't like me."

"You know she does. If she didn't she wouldn't let you stay in her house."

He bent the last wire into shape -- not exactly the right shape, but it would have to do. "I'm glad she didn't try to hang any wire off my shoulders. These are almost as silly as the prickly things we had to wear on Ladna IV."

"I thought you looked terribly handsome in those prickly things."

"I don't have to be an empath to know you're lying through your teeth -- I looked like a walking scrap pile."

"You did not!"

"And you're fat?"

She gaped a moment. "Oh. I suppose it's all in your point of view."

"Let's go antagonize the natives and get it over with."

"Are you trying to embarrass Mother?"

"Not at all. If anything, I'm defending her. This time without the necessity of reciting poetry to Ferengi. If I hear one more snide remark about her *allowing* you to abandon the Fifth House for Starfleet, I'm going to pin that person to the nearest wall and let them know exactly what I think of the situation."

"That wouldn't be -- "

"Deanna," he began, pausing when too much anger came out. He continued with a more pleasant tone; he wasn't angry at her. "At this point, I don't care. They have no right to insult you because of your career. You practically went back to being a cadet to get where you are now -- I refuse to let *anyone* disrespect that! I doubt any one of those self-righteous, pretentious people downstairs have accomplished a fraction of what you've done."

A choked noise from the hall startled them both -- at least he didn't have to fake it. He'd forgotten they had an audience. Deanna hurried to the door. "Mother! How long have you been standing here?"

"I only came to see why you've been gone so long," Lwaxana exclaimed. "Are you feeling better?"

"Fine, Mother, much better."

Jean-Luc followed them out. Lwaxana chattered at her daughter non-stop, claiming a list of people had asked after her and wanted to see her, and wouldn't she want to introduce Jean-Luc to H'ranol of the Sixth House. . . . But on the threshold of the apartment, as Deanna left first, Lwaxana studied him with a raised eyebrow, completely sober. He waited patiently for her to move on; she did so a moment later, catching up with her daughter and exclaiming over the way Deanna had done her hair.

Resigning himself to a long night, he composed himself and walked behind them. At the head of the stairs Lwaxana stopped and glanced back at him again as if making sure he was there, then smiled at Deanna and walked beside her down the steps, putting an arm around her and squashing the coiled wires across her back.

"You know, it's nice to have a man around the house again, dear. I'm glad you came. Even if we did have to host the Festival and come back to this stuffy echoing place -- next time you'll *have* to come when we won't have to waste an entire day on this nonsense. Perhaps after the baby is born. Which reminds me, you'll have to tell me where the *Enterprise* will be in four months. I have to book transports and find a way to meet you so I can come help -- it will be *so* much fun having a grandson to spoil!"

Deanna shot a startled look over her shoulder; Jean-Luc shrugged and rolled his eyes to the ceiling. The change of heart, abrupt as it was, surprised him too.

"And you know Jean-Luc really *does* look *quite* handsome in his uniform," Lwaxana exclaimed, her high-pitched admiration echoing around the foyer. A few groups of people standing below in the hall looked up at them. "Did you notice that there are easily fifty people here and not one of them is hajira? It's no wonder they were all -- "

"Mother," Deanna exclaimed, then looked startled -- she hadn't complained that way until now. Smiling, she glanced at Jean-Luc as they reached the bottom of the steps. "That's an accurate observation, but you know it's impolite to talk that way. You'll make them all jealous."

"Oh, nonsense, I'm only stating the obvious -- you have it, they don't, and you know that was one of the reasons my mother had so much trouble with these things after I married your father, people would come and meet him and turn absolutely green with envy."

Deanna stopped in her tracks just short of the door through which talk and laughter came. She stared at her mother, then at Jean-Luc. "They did?"

"Oh, yes, and the things they said -- impossible, he's human and that simply doesn't happen. But it runs in the family -- obviously we Trois have a lot more to us than we're given credit for."

"I would agree with that," Jean-Luc said.

Deanna raised an eyebrow. She looked at her mother, then at him, thoughtful and suspicious. Lwaxana only continued beaming at them and straightened a few of her springs.

Now he wished he could escape out the nearest window, but of course that wasn't possible. "You know, I think I'll just pop down and say hello to your uncle -- would you mind if I excused myself for a few minutes?"

"No," Lwaxana blurted. Then, assembling her composure, she regained her smile -- not her usual. A grim, determined kind of expression that one would never think Lwaxana Troi might have. "I've been thinking, it's been a while since I've seen my brother -- you go on with Deanna, dear, and I'll just go have a chat with Baymei."

She flitted away, leaving Deanna staring in open amazement -- another unlikely expression in an unlikely place. Her eyes flicked to Jean-Luc's face. "You had something to do with this change in Mother, but for the life of me I can't understand how you did it."

"I didn't do anything, chere. Come on, we're blocking the door."

This room had been chosen for the eclectic furniture that provided places to sit in groups of two to six -- some of the oddly-curved sofa-looking things seemed shaped to provide a maximum of face-to-face conversation. Too many guests stared at them, then of all people Raynma rose from her seat, unfolding those long legs -- she was easily as willowy as Chandra, and the gold dress had nearly the same cut down the front. Her dark straight hair had been let down from its high-piled glory.

Jean-Luc realized as they halted that they stood in the middle of the room, as if intentionally staging a confrontation. And from Raynma's posture it looked to be that.

"So when will the wedding be?" she asked, smiling at Deanna. It pretended to be a smile, anyway.

"We're already married."

Raynma postured -- hand on hip, curving her body in that classic 'S' that ancient Greek sculptors used when carving the human form. Contrasting herself to Deanna, Jean-Luc realized, noticing the way the woman looked at his wife. Dee's hand found his as if she feared he might express the anger.

"Then you don't intend to -- "

"You're repeating yourself for my husband's benefit. I don't appreciate it. I answered these questions earlier." Much earlier -- Jean-Luc hadn't left her side since dinner. It must have been a conversation during that initial round of introductions, when Lwaxana had pulled him off to be introduced to others and left Deanna with Mwala and Plitty.

Raynma's smile faded at the quiet rebuff. "Your mother's daughter, I see."

"Technically, yes, though your conclusion in its intent is erroneous," Jean-Luc said. "When Deanna speaks her mind, she generally gives an accurate report of her perceptions."

"I did not speak to you, Captain."

"Yes, about that -- you don't find it something of a double standard, living in the present but treating your husband as a second-class citizen a few times a year at these re-enactments?" He glanced around at the glittering dresses of the ladies and the not-so-glittering attire of the men. As usual, the women were doing most of the talking, especially in those groups with the older ladies present. "Or did your husband not come with you this year?"

"You are a very rude -- "

"Excuse me, I didn't intend to be -- I'm so sorry, your ladyship. . . I'm sorry, what was I supposed to call them?" He turned to Deanna; she only frowned and gave him a stop-that-or-sleep-on-the-floor glare.

Raynma looked from one to the other. "I can see the Fifth House will continue the trend of disregard for tradition."

"Excuse me?" Deanna's chin came up -- this was the beginnings of the Betazoid Death Glare. Jean-Luc silently rooted for a few loud Klingon swear words, but his more rational side knew that wouldn't be the best thing for her to do.

Raynma's eyes left them, roving to the door, and she lost the remaining disdain in favor of shock. Jean-Luc turned to look.

Lwaxana swooped into the room, rounding on the first House lady she came to with happy exclamations, introducing her brother, Baymei. The gardener followed her sedately, dressed in an appropriately-purple suit; he glanced at Jean-Luc and Deanna, smiled, and stuck out a hand in a thumbs-up gesture. A human gesture.

Jean-Luc returned the gesture, then saw Deanna's expression and turned it into a gesture at the refreshment table in the corner, where Homn faithfully presided over drinks. While the gathered guests fell silent and Lwaxana's happy introductions continued around the room, Jean-Luc studied the array of drinks and chose one. Deanna took a glass Homn produced for her, probably water from the look of it. As they turned away, the servant gave them a thumbs-up and a smile.

Jean-Luc could tell this was going to be explosive. Under his hand, the muscles in Deanna's back went stiff. She was upset and reacting to the emotions around her as well. Mwala and Plitty were sitting in a corner on one of the S-shaped sofas; he guided Deanna toward them, thinking of excuses he could make to get her out of the room entirely. None of them were likely to work at this point. She would want to stay.

{What did you do? And don't tell me nothing, you're too pleased with yourself.} She was upset, no doubt about that.

They sat on a small couch and studied the faces of astonished Betazoid aristocrats in Lwaxana's wake as she made the rounds with her half-brother, Baymei Tay, the gardener.

{I didn't do a thing -- I have no idea what your mother's up to, or why she suddenly decided to stop defending tradition and start breaking it. Whatever happened, the results are certainly more interesting than what was *supposed* to happen. . . .}

~^~^~^~^~

An hour after Baymei's introduction, the whole Festival had turned into civil war. If these were Klingons the floor would be blood-drenched and the furniture all broken. As it was, most of those present had headaches -- Deanna could sense the familiar pain, the anger, the frustration and disbelief.

Interesting did not begin to describe it. Goddess help her, if she didn't love her husband for his intentions and appreciate how diligently he'd applied himself to winning over her mother, she'd behead him. He had to have said something that changed her mother's mind. What a *noodge* he was becoming!

The turmoil brewed silently -- telepaths stewing in indignant outrage. Tradition had been broken. Baymei was *not* a Troi, and introducing him as Lwaxana's half-brother, truthful as it was, was nearly as much an insult to the esteemed Daughters of the Houses of Betazed as Lwaxana seating the gardener right next to Lana of the First House and plying him with questions about *gardening.* Menial work, digging in dirt and eradicating pests -- and she'd been so audacious as to go on for nearly fifteen minutes about *fertilizer.* Lana had to sit and smile through the discussion of the merits of types of dung taking place next to her.

Baymei took his leave politely after half an hour of conversation with his sister, winking at Deanna as he turned to go. As if he'd played a part -- she suspected that was so. Her mother was up to something and enlisting others. If that something was to get herself and her daughter banned from the Houses, she'd made good headway. Lana's fury shrieked nearly as loudly to Deanna as Raynma's, or Shivira's, or Zela's. Diwa was confused and shocked, not quite angry yet.

Deanna sat with her mother's cousins, silent as she'd been throughout the quiet conversation Jean-Luc had with Mwala about archeology, of all things. Neither of them were very interested in what they said. All telepaths in the room knew what was going on; silent conversations had been flying about the room as only telepathic discussion could. Jean-Luc knew *something* was going on, but not what -- he only had facial expressions and behaviors to go on.

Lwaxana made another trip to the drink table, cheeks flushed, and chose a tall swirled pink and green beverage. "Thank you, Mr. Homn. Oh, Zela, there you are, I've been looking all over for you," she cried, apparently oblivious to the near-absence of any other verbal conversation and the politely-hostile looks from her peers.

Zela rose from the chevaree and confronted the Daughter of the Fifth House with feline hostility, prowling around intervening furniture and people, the light dancing on the ruby-red spangles of her dress. Instead of a low-cut neckline, her dress had a high-cut front hem, nearly giving a view of cleavage from beneath; her crotch was concealed, but only barely, by a narrow strip of material that on a Terran would be part of a swimsuit. On a Betazoid it was merely clothing -- Betazoids on their homeworld didn't bother with nonsense like swim suits.

"You are deliberately insulting House tradition," Zela exclaimed. It brought the gathered onlookers upright in an instant -- the battle had begun, the first verbal blow struck by the Sixth House. Deanna detected something that felt like relief from her mother -- she'd been right. Lwaxana wanted to provoke them. What in the name of Telistra was she doing?

"Oh, Zela, I know we haven't been on the best of terms recently," Lwaxana gushed, coming toward Zela with a hand out in supplication. "I had hoped we could set that aside, if only for the evening. It's been so pleasant until now -- why, hosting all my dear friends again and having my daughter and her husband, and -- "

"Her zemaisk," Zela corrected, using the more archaic term referring to what Jean-Luc would have labeled a 'concubine.'

"Her *husband,*" Lwaxana corrected -- she used more force and volume than usual, too. Pushing. She held up her drink. "To my son-in-law, Captain Picard -- a fine officer, a hero! A man unparalleled in strength and courage!"

"She's drunk," Jean-Luc muttered in disbelief, embarrassed by the sudden acclaim.

"You are out of order," Lana cried, rising from her seat. She was the shortest, but commanded attention by her stature. "Completely out of order!"

"Don't tell me what I am -- this is my House and you are my guest!" Lwaxana squared her shoulders and marched over to Lana. "If I want to drink to my son-in-law as Terrans do, I can!"

"That isn't what she meant," Raynma said, unfolding herself from a chevaree behind Lana. "Introducing a gardener as your -- "

"And just what is wrong with being a gardener? It's honest work -- unlike being an accountant for a corrupt -- "

"My brother was not involved," Raynma grated through clenched teeth. "None of that was his doing!"

"Your brother would sell his own mother to the Ferengi," Lwaxana shot back, eliciting general shock from all sides. "And he'd throw you in for half a strip of latinum more."

"You *will not* speak to -- "

"Oh, come down off the cloud, Lana! I'm tired of it," Lwaxana cried, gesturing wildly at the crowd. "All of you are so concerned about the Houses and perpetuating tradition -- what in the name of all that's holy makes any of you think you'll be able to perpetuate *any of it* without willing volunteers? You sneer and giggle and point at anyone who has the audacity to do something questionable -- how dare I actually marry someone I love instead of some pie-eyed, pasty-faced fat man I saw once as a child? How dare I allow my daughter to run off and join Starfleet? How dare *you* presume to judge what's best for either of us!"

Deanna forgot the headache that had been building up behind her eyes. She stared at her mother -- her furious mother who paced and yanked sparkling wire coils off her dress as if they were biting insects, all the while sloshing her drink on ducking onlookers. Baymei and the deliberate insults were only precursor to this. She was angry, as she'd been only a few times before -- so angry that she hit the other Houses where it hurt. So angry she'd built insult upon insult, until they attacked first and she could mount a defense.

"Let me ask you something," Lwaxana said, her voice dropping an octave and about twenty decibels. She waved her half-full, untouched drink under Lana's nose. "Are your children happy? What about yours, Zela? Oh, I'm so sorry, that's right, you don't *have* any -- you keep having to swindle men into marrying you and when they find out they're supposed to walk four paces behind you in any House function and not speak without being spoken to -- "

"I will not stand here and listen to this," Zela spat. Her dramatic exit was ruined by the sudden appearance of a tall woman in purple. She stood in the center of the door, not completely blocking it, but halting the other woman with a glare.

Deanna's hand went to her belly -- she was certain her heart had stopped for good, when suddenly it gave a lopsided thud and resumed at an erratic, rapid rate. She glanced back and forth from her mother to the newcomer -- their eyes met. Walima didn't flinch, nor did Lwaxana. They smiled at each other!

"Mother," Deanna gasped.

Mwala gripped her arm. "Dena, are you all right?"

"Just, surprised," she breathed. "Walima. She never answered any of my calls -- why were you at the restaurant that night? Why was she wearing purple?"

"Your mother didn't want us to tell you but 'lima wanted so badly to see you," Mwala whispered. "When Lwaxana found out about the baby she was so happy she published it in the news -- you know her, House proud in spite of everything, and she was so irritated by the insinuations that she would never have grandchildren. Walima called her and they've been in contact ever since. They've been trying to find a way to break the news to you but neither one knew how you would take it -- Walima wanted to see you and when we found out she wanted to just stop in, we persuaded her to let us come first, to see how things were with you. If you hadn't left for the House we would have talked to you then. When we came that evening Lwaxana told us which restaurant you were at, and Walima insisted -- Dena, are you sure you're all right?"

Jean-Luc was pulling her over to him and touching her face. His hands felt hot. "In shock. Dee, this was why your mother has been so unlike herself. She's been afraid of how you would take this."

"Oh, Goddess," she moaned, staring at the scene playing before them.

Walima had entered the room slowly. Time had been less kind to her than to Lwaxana; deep creases on either side of her mouth and a certain looseness to her skin, and streaks of gray in her black hair, cut to jaw length and straight -- only someone with formidable features like Walima's could wear a chiseled style like that well.

Walima and Lwaxana circled around a common target, Lana and Raynma, who stood together and watched like trapped prey.

"You were banned," Lana intoned.

"I was. Obviously, no longer." Walima's voice had acquired a gravelly texture, but was as Deanna remembered, low and intense. "I understand there is some question of propriety?"

Deanna couldn't breathe. That voice, that had echoed down these halls denying and defending herself, then accusing -- The fury and shock she sensed from the assembled onlookers rolled over her and pressed the air from her lungs. A sound like insects swarming filled her ears.

"Jean-Luc," she cried, as the darkness slipped around her like a cloak.

~^~^~^~^~

When Deanna slumped, Jean-Luc caught her and lowered her gently to the floor. "A doctor," he snapped, looking at Mwala and Plitty, and the sisters sprang from the sofa to hurry across the room for the door. Once unconscious, Deanna's breathing seemed to return to normal, unlike his own. He felt along her throat for a pulse, knowing that his own would be racing if he had one.

"Oh, no," Lwaxana cried, dropping to her knees -- he hadn't paid attention, but she must have broken some sort of record for sprinting in high heels. Walima was there too, crying and leaning to look.

"She fainted. Too much excitement and not enough rest," he exclaimed. "Dee. . . come on, don't do this to me!"

Her eyelids were in motion already, her head rolling toward his voice, and she panted for air, then apparently passed out again. It was hot -- the collar of his uniform was strangling him. Too many people being too tense for too long in a closed room. He should have followed his first impulse and removed her from this when he noticed the change in the emotional atmosphere.

"Open windows, get some air in here," he demanded. When no one moved he raised his voice. "Do it! Damn you and your petty bickering, open the windows!"

Someone moved, and the rattle of a latch preceded a rush of cool night air. He glanced at Lwaxana; she seemed about to faint herself, fingers over her mouth and one hand on Deanna's abdomen.

A clatter of footsteps, and Mwala and Plitty reappeared, followed by a doctor -- he must have come by transporter. Jean-Luc ordered everyone out of the way, and this time people scurried to obey. He had to pull Lwaxana away and let her cling to his arm.

The doctor took moments to make an assessment with a tricorder. "She needs rest -- I suggest you take her home," he said, rising and looking around in search of a responsible party. "She'll be fine. No more party for her. Give her something to drink, water, or better, some ebi'lan -- then let her sleep until she wakes up." No more party -- the Betazoid doctor obviously had no idea what Alipha was about. Jean-Luc wanted to laugh at it, but his fury strangled it out of him.

Lwaxana's fingers relaxed -- it was about time, Jean-Luc was sure she'd left her fingerprints on his forearm. "Upstairs," she said. "That would be best. We should make up the bed -- Homn, go up and find the linens! Mwala, find something to drink -- oh, but could she make it up those stairs?"

Deanna sat up by this time, still looking not quite herself, and took Jean-Luc's hand when he offered it. When she swayed on her feet, he scooped her up and headed for the door, brushing past the startled onlookers. He hesitated to glare at Lana and Raynma, then looked around the room at the other guests.

"It's been an entertaining evening, and I've enjoyed a glimpse into your traditions. I find them intriguing; I've always been fascinated by history. However, I think that if your behavior is typical of these events, this will be the last one I attend, interesting as it's been. Now, go home."

"Who do you think you are?" Lana exclaimed, getting hers in first before the other shocked exclamations started.

"I am the husband of Deanna Troi, who has just been told to rest, and who will not be able to rest as long as overwrought people remain in this house." Some of his anger escaped, slowly at first, but rising along with his volume as he spoke. "I am the man who will throw every last one of you down the hill if he finds any of you here when he comes down in fifteen minutes to be certain you're gone. I was perfectly willing to respect your right to indulge in whatever nonsense you wanted, until it threatened the well-being of my wife and son!"

"Jean-Luc," Deanna chided. "Don't snap at them like they're misbehaving cadets." Her arms tightened around his neck; she was getting a little stronger.

"You be quiet." He strode from the room without another glance at the guests, Deanna heavy in his arms and clinging, flinching into his shoulder as they passed through the door. Chaos broke out in his wake. Lwaxana's voice rose over the complaints of the guests, demanding their departure, and her strident insistence was joined by the deeper voice of Walima, seconding the orders. He took the stairs at a fast walk, hoping to avoid an audience when people started to leave. By the time he reached the top, his arms had begun to ache. Petite as she was, Deanna wasn't light.

"Jean-Luc, it wasn't necessary to send them away. The Festival -- "

"The damned Festival turned into a fiasco when your mother brought in Baymei. Forget it. She obviously has no intention of continuing it."

He had to put her down at the door to the apartment. Taking chances with the narrower opening wasn't acceptable. She turned to him in the dimly-lit hallway, tears streaking dark eye makeup down the flowers painted on her cheeks. "It wasn't the emotional strain, though that didn't help. It was the shock of hearing Walima's voice -- it brought it all back so clearly. And Mother already made contact -- I worried so much for no reason! I should have listened to you." She tilted her head, gaping. "How did you know?"

"I didn't know. But. . . ." He winced, trying to put it gently. "Didn't you tell me once that there are stages of development in our lives that correlate roughly with. . . . "

"You mean you're about the same age, and you knew Mother had probably reached a point at which she would want to reconcile," she said, faintly acerbic. She always disliked references to his age.

"Rest, Deebird," he said, guiding her through the open door. "I need to take off this jacket and go bounce a few Betazoids down the hill."

"You can't -- "

"I don't give a damn who they are. Your mother wants them gone. She made her appeal and it fell on deaf ears."

"It has before. It probably will again." Her hand found his, her fingers wrapping around two of his. "But she's never made it so strongly or so directly, and it may be her last chance. They can ban the Fifth House. It takes a lot for that to happen, but it's possible."

Homn crossed paths with them in the living room; he had been in her old room. Jean-Luc led her in and glanced at the bed, now made up in white linens much as it had been in the holodeck, so long ago and far away. Sliding the door closed, he undid the back of her dress, slipped his hands underneath it, pushing it from her as if peeling off a dead layer of skin. It seemed to be, in places. The seams left indentations.

Deanna stood still, letting him smooth his palms along her sides. "Mother's furious," she whispered. "Shouting. Walima, too. Hurts."

"Come here, focus on me instead. Think of Yves."

"It's all right. I'm past that dangerous stage."

He removed the jacket and tossed it on the foot of the bed, then pulled her against him. "Doesn't matter. You need to rest."

"I'm not frail, Jean-Luc." But she sounded tired, and petulant.

"I know. You're the strongest person I know. You're even strong in the broken places."

She let him guide her forward at last. Tucking her in brought a brittle smile to her face. "I want to wash my face."

"Rest there for a few minutes, and when I get back we'll settle in for the night. Humor me, Deebird."

"All right. But just because you were so cute, being protective that way. janluq pIqarD." She giggled -- she was exhausted and mood-swinging. He recognized the vaguely-familiar words as his name, Klingon-style. Groaning, he opted not to comment.

He remembered the doctor's orders and asked Homn to get her something to drink as he passed through the apartment. People were leaving as he came down the dangling staircase, and walked faster upon seeing him; he ignored them and made for the room he meant to see cleared.

More people hurried for the door when he strode into the room. It wasn't hard to be angry at those who remained -- Raynma, Lana, and Zela. The trouble was how to make good on his threat without manhandling them. They seemed determined to stay put, with crossed arms and hostile glares, standing in a row facing down the four Troi women in purple.

"I see you like tempting fate," he exclaimed, smiling coldly.

"You are Starfleet. Where were you when the Breen came? Where were you when they destroyed our House?" Raynma exclaimed. She sounded genuinely hostile. Staring at her, he realized then who she was. The Second House had been a casualty of war, and he had met one of its members before.

"You know, I would have never guessed you're related to Habar. He was very pleasant to me. I see he didn't make it home from Galisi for the Festival, though I don't have to wonder about why -- I presume they will be making their own traditions on the new colony. Which is as it should be. I think your ancestors would be very disappointed in you. I've listened all day to stories of women who loved their family and made sacrifices for them, yet you won't recognize that foolish pride is hurting your own."

"Why should we not be proud of our traditions?" Lana glared at him. "You don't belong here. You have no right to criticize our ways."

"Normally, I would agree with you. But if my children are expected to participate in this, I have a right to know what that would entail." He strolled around them, forcing them to turn to maintain eye contact. "I was on your side -- tradition is important, history is important. My children's heritage is important. But if this is all that's left of it, a bunch of infighting women, then I am forced to reconsider. You value tradition above the welfare of the living, and that makes no rational sense."

"You have no respect for centuries of tradition." Zela prowled around Raynma and Lana to face him. He'd drawn the full attention of all the women; the Troi cousins, even Lwaxana, seemed content to let him have the floor. He wasn't certain whether to be thankful for that or not.

The irony of it. Here he was in the middle of another tradition verses self-determination controversy. When he began to laugh dryly, all of them looked askance at him, three of them becoming more furious, four only curious. He threw his hands up as if surrendering and advanced a few steps -- Zela fell behind Lana, so he stopped almost toe to toe with the haughty woman in white, hands on his hips, and spoke to all three of them.

"*You* have no respect for those who fought to make sure you were able to keep following your tradition. You have no awareness of who I am, or who Deanna is. To answer your question, during the war I was aboard my ship, in a series of running battles with the Dominion, attempting to prevent their reinforcements from reaching this far into Federation space again. Shortly after that, I was facing the Borg. A captain relies on his officers -- if not for people like Deanna, who are willing to risk their lives time after time in the line of duty, you and every last one of your traditions would be nothing more than another fact duly filed away in the databanks of the Borg Collective."

He advanced again, stabbing a finger to punctuate his words, and they backed off but still looked angry. "You can sit in your houses and preen and congratulate yourselves on your adherence to rituals that vex your children and make their lives miserable while all their friends are free to marry as they please -- but *don't* you *ever* forget that there are people who *died* to preserve your freedom to do so. You can be angry as you like that the Dominion captured your world -- you're still alive. Hundreds of thousands of people on worlds closer to the fighting can't be angry -- they're all *dead.* Complain to me one more time that I don't respect your traditions, madame, and I'll start listing the names of crewmen I've lost in the fight to ensure that you'll live to keep them. I'll read you the list of Borg implants removed from my body. I'll start quoting the commendations from Deanna's service record. I'll give you more evidence than you care to know about that any single Starfleet officer has made more personal sacrifices to ensure the continuance of House tradition than all of the actual participants in the Houses themselves! While you, on the other hand, demand the sacrifices of others -- you force your children to mold their lives to your specifications, for no other purpose than to remember antiquated practices of your ancestors. This is not keeping the memory of your past alive, this is enslavement to it!"

The silence that followed was broken at last by Lwaxana -- she strode from the room, or nearly so. Stopping in the door, she pointed imperiously, and Jean-Luc realized she was demanding that the three interlopers leave.

Raynma left first, disappearing around the edge of the door with a flutter of gold skirt. Zela waited only a moment longer before making a sweeping exit of her own.

Lana came slowly forward, and he wondered then if the others hadn't received silent orders to leave. The woman seemed to draw herself up straighter with each step, doing her best to loom large though she was shorter than he.

"The Troi family has been determined to dishonor our ways for years," she began, her voice low and sibilant. From the tilt of her head and jut of her chin, Lana was winding up for a full-blown dramatic rebuttal. The Trois shifted, one footstep echoing in the silent room, and Jean-Luc heard a sharp intake of breath from Lwaxana. He took advantage of the pause.

"No. You have dishonored them for years -- you and your sisterhood. You dishonor the memory of a man who took your culture as his own. The Federation is what it is because of officers like Ian Troi and his daughter." He loomed over her, forcing her backward with each step he took, glaring. "You dishonor yourselves, by allowing their sacrifices to go unacknowledged. What I saw here tonight was despicable. I believed that Deanna Troi was an example of what I would find in the Houses of Betazed -- instead I discover that she is the exception to the rule, that she and her family had to rise above the hollow charade they're expected to live out! Not only that, but their supposed peers sneer and laugh at them!"

Lana seemed to puff up several sizes. "How dare you imply -- "

"I imply *nothing*!"

"You imply that they are superior, when in fact they are an embarrassment to -- "

"Would *you* endanger your life for the sake of preserving others? Because I know of three Trois who have done so. How many of your family have saved a *single* life? Do you want a head count of how many lives Deanna saved? Here I am -- number one! Several times over -- I've lost count, actually. Seven hundred or so back on our ship, over a thousand on the previous *Enterprise* and that at least twice directly. She saved her mother's life on Adnalon, she saved an away team on Galisi, not to mention she aided in saving the lives of Betazoid colonists, a number of whom were House members if I recall. Shall I go on?"

Lana deflated slightly; a flicker of confusion lit her eyes before the anger and resolve returned. Backing a step, she glared -- frantically thinking of a defense, probably, and fighting to keep up a strong front. He wanted this over. He knew what she would do, throw more words at him, and before she could, he continued in a more normal tone.

"Tell me again how dishonorable it is for a daughter of the Fifth House to be in Starfleet instead of sitting around the House raising little girls to turn into arrogant women who can't see that in the very act of maintaining centuries-old tradition, they dishonor the men and women who make it possible for them to keep it. You offend me. You offend my crewmates. You offend my family. My name is not Troi, but my wife's name is, quite contrary to her husband's tradition. She came here and endured your disdain tonight, as she's done many times before. What reason other than the Festival could she have? You tell me again that Deanna Troi doesn't respect her heritage!"

"Get out!" Lana roared, the blood rising in her face.

"YOU get out! This isn't YOUR house!" Jean-Luc roared back.

With a toss of her head that dislodged half her curls that had been so carefully tucked up on top of her head, Lana marched out of the room.

"And don't let the door hit your -- " Lwaxana cut herself off when Jean-Luc cleared his throat and glared. Leaning against the edge of the door, she straightened her dress fastidiously and pursed her lips to keep them from smiling.

He looked around the room, and was startled to find someone standing along a wall, behind a large white statue -- as he stared the young man left the shadow of the statue and scurried for the door, breaking into a run as he passed Jean-Luc.

"Jo'fil," Lwaxana cried indignantly as the man shot by her. "Oh, dear!"

"Little *jhelihavra*," Walima exclaimed, crossing her arms. "He hid just to listen in."

"How is Deanna?" Plitty blurted. "I hope -- "

"She's fine, Plitty, obviously," Lwaxana exclaimed, waving a hand in Jean-Luc's direction. "Otherwise he wouldn't have left her alone. I'll bet she heard every word -- what volume! I told you he wouldn't be able to keep it in, 'lima. He's been absolutely furious all night. He can't help himself, he *has* to come to the rescue -- "

"I think he was simply wonderful," Mwala said, raising her voice to cut across Lwaxana's rush of words. "This was the most entertaining Festival I've ever been to!"

Jean-Luc glanced at their smiling faces and did his best red alert running walk out of the room, as it looked to be an embarrassing situation in the making.

"Jean-Luc, I haven't introduced you to -- "

"Tomorrow, Lwaxana, I have to go make Deanna go back to bed."

"But -- "

She stopped when Deanna appeared at the other end of the hall, coming around the last curve at the bottom of the staircase. Jean-Luc pointed straight up. "Get back up there!"

"What were you shouting about?" she called, standing on the bottom stair.

"Nothing you should worry about at the moment. The doctor said rest, dammit!"

"How am I supposed to rest when you're bellowing?" She started back up before he reached her, but he caught up -- her leisurely pace made it easy. At the top of the stairs she stopped and looked him in the eye. She wore a white robe, her hands tucked in the loose sleeves and her hair loose around her shoulders, and she'd washed the makeup off her face.

The residual ire of his confrontation drained away at the sight of her. Gently pushing her toward the apartment, he leaned to kiss the nape of her neck through her curls.

"You impressed them," she murmured, smiling radiantly. "You spoke on the behalf of the Fifth House. Mother says she's very sorry she ever spoke against you -- "

"Tomorrow, Deebird. Please."

"Mother and Walima are arguing about who's going to stay in the other bedroom in the apartment. Mwala and Plitty are going home."

"Aren't there other bedrooms in this place? Why argue?"

"Because the closer they are to hajira the more they can sense -- they aren't empaths, you know, just telepaths with empathic leanings. I told them you would insist that I sleep but they don't believe me."

"Dee. . . ."

"Oh, all right. I'm teasing. They're really interested in sensing the baby."

They entered the apartment. She had replicated a robe for him as well, and climbed in bed while he closed himself in the bathroom. After he settled in bed with her, he considered, then asked, "You weren't teasing, were you?"

"Do you really want to know?" Deanna sighed and nestled closer against his chest. "I still don't know how you managed this. Mother's actually happy. Walima's back, and impressed with you already. I suppose now I should thank you for bringing me home."

"Are you done kicking and screaming about it?"

"Yes."

"It took me weeks and a verbal battle with haughty House women, but I actually won an argument. I think I'm going to make this an official ship's holiday. Um. . . . Maybe not. Let go?"

~^~^~^~^~

Deanna woke alone. In a few disoriented moments of startled deja vu, she wondered if she hadn't been shot back through time. The window was open to let in cool morning breezes and birdsong. She might have been fifteen again, alone, her mother off on one of her errands or social calls. Then Yves kicked and reminded her of when and who she was.

Her back hurt. The mattress was softer than she was accustomed to. As she got up slowly, her bare feet finding the floor cold to the touch, she heard distant laughter. Pulling on her robe, she went to look out the window. Baymei was making his rounds of the garden with Jean-Luc. Apparently her husband had replicated or borrowed some plainer clothing for the occasion. They stopped at the ijipani tree and Baymei showed his guest how to pick the fruit. The two were chatting amiably, and as they moved on, Jean-Luc tried to juggle four of the fruit. He gave up after two attempts and settled for eating them.

The replicator in the kitchen hadn't seen this much use in years, she was certain. As she punched up options for clothing she lamented the age of the unit and the limited selection -- it had been used for food almost exclusively and had only the basic system defaults for anything else. She had to settle for simple and loose, borrowing the gray undershirt from Jean-Luc's dress uniform for warmth before pulling on the bright blue tunic. She needed maternity clothes, she thought with a sigh when the pants didn't fit and she had to recycle them. A black skirt had to suffice. With the tunic over it, she looked even bigger than she did in uniform.

She replicated a big bowl of hot seblitzi, and it smelled so good she leaned against the counter and ate with abandon. The front door opened as she scraped bottom.

"Well, you seem to be feeling much better," her mother exclaimed happily, rushing through the dining area to join her in the kitchen. "Just a few days ago you didn't like the way seblitzi smelled. How is my grandson today?" She leaned as if she could see through clothing and abdominal wall to look Yves in the eye.

"Mother, please don't talk to my navel. If he can hear at all he can do it just as well if you're standing up."

Lwaxana looked up at her, then brought herself upright, smiling in that motherly affectionate way that announced a serious discussion. "I'm sorry about what happened last night, dear."

Deanna pondered the replicator menu again, finally picking something innocuous from the short list of Terran items that had been added. She picked up the dish of ice cream and licked some of the fudge off the back of her spoon. Her mother stared at the dish, chin dropping. "What, Mother?"

"Ice cream for breakfast?"

"There's no recipe for fudge brownies in this thing -- you need a new replicator in here."

Lwaxana crossed her arms. "Deanna, you shouldn't be eating this way. Does Jean-Luc let you get away with this?"

"No. Why do you think I'm doing it now?"

Her mother punched a button, picked up the dish of ice cream after it materialized, and tasted it. Shrugging, she leaned against the counter and ate tiny bites of vanilla with hot fudge. "Walima was so afraid your fainting was her fault."

"If you had just told me from the beginning you'd let her back in the House it wouldn't have happened! Mother, what were you thinking? A simple message would have -- what are you smirking about?"

"I'm sorry. I was worried about how you would take the news, you were so upset then and so full of rage for months afterward whenever anyone mentioned her. I didn't want to shock you into miscarriage. And then when it wasn't such a danger, I thought it would keep you from coming home at all, if I said something and you reacted badly." She took a bigger bite. "But, you know. . . in a way it was revenge for your not telling me about Jean-Luc all those months."

"Mother -- "

"Unintentional revenge, I should say. I would *never* hold it against you that you spent so many months being Captain Picard's live-in lover and never told me about it."

Deanna stared at the tile floor. White tile, with those purple and black Fifth House starbursts. At several points in her life, she'd hated that symbol with a passion. "You don't understand. I wanted to tell you."

She heard her mother's spoon strike the edge of the bowl, then the clink of putting dish and spoon on the countertop. Glancing at Lwaxana out of the corner of her eye, Deanna saw that her mother had covered her face with both hands.

"I know I haven't been a proper mother -- "

"There is no such thing as a *proper* mother! You've always done your best -- you don't have anything to be ashamed of, Mother."

She sniffed, steepling her hands over her nose and eyeing Deanna in tired amusement. "I behaved very badly when I came aboard the ship and found the two of you glowing at each other. I thought he wouldn't want a thing to do with me. He's never liked me."

"But you never gave him the chance to like you."

"Yes, I know, dear." She dropped her hands, smiling whimsically. "He's even diagnosed me -- I was over-reacting to subconsciously sabotage the possibility of developing another hajira because I was afraid of the pain of losing one again."

Deanna's jaw dropped. "He said that? Oh, Mother! I don't believe he would be that oblivious. Didn't you tell him it was only because he was so much fun to tease?"

"But he was so *proud* of himself for his profound insight," she exclaimed, waving a hand. "And how much fun would he be if he figured out how to become *less* fun to tease?"

Giggling, Deanna left her empty bowl on the counter and started for the door. "Is Walima still here?"

"Can't you tell?"

"I can, but I'm used to pretending I can't."

"Oh, Little One, you've lived too much among humans."

Her mother followed her down the narrow hall, the pink and yellow fabric wrapped over and around her folded like furled butterfly wings. "You know, dear, it *did* surprise me that you never got back together with Will."

"Don't, Mother. Please."

Lwaxana followed her wordlessly to the bottom of the stairs. When no explanation of her pensiveness was forthcoming, Deanna stopped on one of the large tile mosaics in the hall and turned around with crossed arms.

"What?"

"You told me nothing about Jean-Luc because you didn't know what would happen. You told me so much about you and Will, and you were so sure of him -- "

"*Why* is everyone practicing psychology without a license?" Deanna cried, waving her hands. "I didn't tell you because I was afraid of how you would react! Mother, you flirted with the man shamelessly! Most of the time I don't know what goes on in your head -- you're too good at blocking me out! How was I supposed to know what you would do?"

Her mother's sly, tiny smile stopped her cold. "Oh, dear, dear Little One," she murmured. "You worried about so much. But you had so much to worry about -- how did your friend the doctor take it? I know she was very fond of him -- "

"Mother!"

Lwaxana folded her hands and bowed her head in resignation. "All right, dear. Protect their privacy. Even if I know about it already."

Deanna tossed her head and marched for the back of the House. Her mother followed sedately.

"I suppose it says everything that needs to be said, anyway -- even if you did worry about the feelings of your best friend and your mother, you pursued -- "

"Stop it," Deanna blurted. "Just stop it! I don't want to talk about it!"

"Neither do I."

Hands on the exit to the verandah along the back of the House, Deanna heard the sincerity and the tremble in her mother's voice. She turned around slowly and met her eyes. "It isn't because I don't trust you. It isn't because I feel ashamed, or that I have anything to hide, really. It's just. . . ."

"Just private," her mother said, shaking her head, smiling ruefully. "I would tell you about your father, but it was so difficult -- my sister had died and I was left with the responsibility to the House. I married my first husband, fooling myself that it was because I loved him, but I can look back and see that it was my way of rebelling -- then I met your father and understood what it was really like to be in love. And even though everyone else thought I was crazy, it was the happiest time of my life. I hope you don't mind my not wanting to tell you. Some things are simply too precious to cheapen with words." Lwaxana laid a hand against her cheek and leaned to kiss her other cheek, a rare gesture from her. "Hajira is a beautiful place to be. I hope you stay that way for the rest of your lives together, Deanna. I hope neither of you allows anything to come between you."

Tears welled up, fed by fragments of memories and the sadness she sensed in her mother. "What did you and Daddy argue about before my first Festival?"

Her mother backed away from her slowly, looking woefully at the floor. "Old arguments are best forg -- "

"Why were you so upset with him? Did he refuse to go? I can't remember."

"We argued after the Festival, not before," Lwaxana said, now crying slow tears. "Lana upset you when you went up for recognition -- you cried and Lana criticized me for not preparing you well enough for the ritual. Your father was furious. I should have listened to him. Your father wanted to confront Lana himself but knew he had no right and that she would pay no attention, so he wanted me to go to her. I wasn't confident enough to do that. If I had confronted Lana then, instead of waiting so many years. . . ." A slow smile broke through, unexpectedly. "Jean-Luc didn't know any better. She was so shocked when he ordered everyone out. The Festival has never gone unfinished -- the Chalice has been left unlit for the first time. I wanted to simply send you home, but I knew there would be reporters. Too much had already happened and word travels fast."

The ramifications of last night's chaos finally came clear. "Mother, why did you bring Baymei in and cause such a scandalous scene?"

Her eyes flashed in remembered anger. "I just couldn't stand another minute of it -- Jean-Luc was absolutely correct, none of them knows what you do. After he took you upstairs he let Lana know exactly what he thought -- oh, how shocked she was! She deserved every word, the raving -- "

The echoes of a door opening and closing interrupted them. "Dee?" came the summons, impatient and concerned.

"Jean," she called. He came down the hall rapidly, standard issue boots making a familiar staccato -- she'd heard those boots striking all kinds of surfaces on all kinds of worlds. He looked like a gardener, with dirt on the knees of his brown trousers and a leaf in a fold of his sleeve.

"How nice of you to bring me flowers," Lwaxana cried at the sight of the brilliant pink and yellow blossoms in his hand.

"Good morning, Lwaxana. I suppose it would have been nice to bring you some, wouldn't it?" He handed them to Deanna. "All right?"

"Yes. Thank you." She sniffed the ula flowers -- too bad they reminded her of Raynma and her face painting. They smelled sweet enough, though. "Have you met Walima?"

"Briefly. Baymei invited me along for the grand tour of the gardens. What did you eat?"

Deanna pushed the exit open with her shoulder. "Jean-Luc, I already have a mother. I ate more than usual and I feel fine."

"Ice cream," Lwaxana said breezily as she followed Deanna outside and dodged around her daughter on the way to the bench at the edge of the verandah, where Walima sat looking out on the gardens.

"Oh, *Mother!*"

Jean-Luc chuckled. "At least it was something other than pickles."

Deanna stood at the end of the bench then, looking at her mother and Walima seated together on the stone bench. Her stomach tightened as their cousin looked up at her; Walima's dark eyes were full of joy, an emotion Deanna couldn't sense -- too much of her own trepidation got in the way.

Lwaxana glanced back and forth between them, then jumped up and hurried away without a word. Jean-Luc followed her example but instead of going in the house he took the steps down to the gardens and meandered down the path to the trees at the bottom of the hill.

Walima dropped her gaze, folding her hands in her lap. "I'm sorry, Dihanna."

Deanna sat on the bench. Cold stone, even through the layers of skirt and tunic. It warmed quickly enough. Yves fluttered briefly as if reassuring his mama. She noticed in a detached way that it was cold enough to turn her breath visible. Clouds blanketed the sky -- the weather net had provided for rain. She considered going inside for a coat, but it wasn't *that* cold, and the borrowed undershirt helped.

"I should have realized what was happening, years ago. I should have known those things your mother said were out of anger -- I didn't know what it was like, being a mother. When I had my own children after that, I realized that I would have done the same." Walima spoke distantly, as if addressing the seam of the long dark blue coat she wore; she ran a finger down the row of silver fasteners absently. She brought her eyes up to meet Deanna's once more, and ventured a slight smile. "I called her, did she tell you that?"

"No."

"You are surprised. It isn't unlike Lwaxana to simply dismiss it without telling you -- I tried to send you messages. She refused them. Programmed her terminal to refuse them automatically. She told me that if I ever tried to call again she would press charges. At that point, she had gotten in Lana's good graces once more, and in spite of the public belief that the Houses are silly, there are still a good many connections between the government and the First House."

"But why didn't you try when I left Betazed for the Academy?"

Her eyes dropped again. "I lost my temper again. I heard through Mwala that you were leaving, and tried to come see you. Lwaxana had already left with you for the spaceport. I waited, thinking if I saw her face to face, we could work things out. She was the same, the second time -- furious with me. I decided that I would be foolish to even try any more. And life has a way of keeping one busy, making one lose track of time. It became easier to not think about you. Refusing your calls was difficult at first, but I knew if I spoke to you it would infuriate your mother -- it was protectiveness of you that motivated her. I didn't want to cause you any problems. I saw in the news when you were posted to the *Enterprise.* Your mother was so proud of you, she put it out on all the major news nets. I saw it again when you were promoted, and when you were pregnant -- my sisters had stopped saying anything about either of you long before, but when I saw that, it began to hurt."

She brushed tears from her cheeks, her movement jerky and irritable as if crying was an inconvenience. Her fingers unfastened and refastened the clasps on her coat repeatedly.

"I realized how much time had passed, and how my own children had grown. How you never met them. I almost named my daughter Dihanna. I was pregnant with her when that first argument took place, did you know? She's in Starfleet now. A lieutenant on the *Ramses,* in the sciences department. Her name is Tessa. She wants to meet you -- I told her everything, in one of my messages to her just before I called your mother. It felt *so* good, to get it out in the open. Tessa didn't understand why I was so upset -- she said I should try again, because so much time had passed. Lwaxana couldn't have kept a grudge for so long." Walima sniffed, smiling with trembling lips. "Tessa should have been a counselor."

"I'll have to send her a message. You said you had other children?"

"Yes, my son's name is Kam. He is still at the University. Studying the nuances of agriculture -- I never would have imagined it. He was always so much more interested in music, but when he reached ascension that all changed. They say it often does. It makes one a new person all over again. . . ." She studied Deanna's face, then traced her cheek with a fingertip. "It must have been so hard for you. Reaching ascension and not realizing it, and all those sensations confusing you. Can you forgive an old fool for not recognizing it?"

Deanna put out her arms. Leaning on her cousin's shoulder, wrapped up in her arms and held cheek to the rough front of her coat, she cried with her for a while. Walima touched her thoughts; at the gentle request for contact she acquiesced, and felt the thoughts of the cousin she believed she'd lost.

&lt;I missed you, Aunt 'lima.&gt;

&lt;Hush, child. We can begin again. You're such a different person now than you were -- so strong, and so happy. I feared for you back then because you were already so sensitive, and I thought if you became an empath like other hybrids you would have difficulty functioning. And your mother refused to discuss it with me. I worried so, and now I see it was for no reason.&gt;

&lt;And when I sensed that worry I misread it completely. I'm so sorry.&gt;

&lt;We all made our mistakes, Dihanna. What a wonderful life you have made for yourself. I can sense how satisfied you are with it -- you must be very happy with your career and your husband, and the baby is already a little presence. I can't wait to hold him in my arms. It will be so nice having a baby in the family again.&gt;

Deanna laughed joyfully. &lt;He will have his father's eyes.&gt;

"How do you know this?" Walima exclaimed, surprised into verbalization.

"I just know that he will." Deanna pulled away, wiping her sleeves across her cheeks. "He'll be his father's son."

A gentle pattering noise became audible, and she realized it was the rain that had been threatening to fall, striking the leaves of the carefully-tended shrubbery of the gardens. She stood and stepped to the edge of the verandah, opening her mouth and tipping her head back. The first few drops felt cool on her forehead. She thought of Jean-Luc's poem, and reached for him automatically; his affectionate response came immediately.

"What are you doing?" Walima asked, even as Jean-Luc questioned wordlessly.

{Drinking the rain.} Deanna let droplets join happy tears on her cheeks, closing her eyes and smiling blissfully. "I don't see much rain, living on a starship. I've always liked the rain."

"Dee!" Jean-Luc's shout came from a distance, somewhere in the trees.

Deanna headed for the steps. "Let's go see what he's excited about."

"You can tell he's excited," Walima said, following closely. "At such a distance?"

She stifled dismay at the underestimation of her ability. "Being an empath doesn't mean weakness. It's just not telepathic."

They reached the end of the path, and of cultivated terrain. Deanna broke into a run, stepping lightly through the grass as she passed into the woods. Finding her hajira wasn't hard at all; she followed the pull of heart to heart, and Walima followed her, panting to keep up.

They emerged from a grove of young trees into a clearing. Rain on the leaf canopy that nearly closed out the sky overhead sounded loud here, and the air was heavy with the smell of green things and moisture. Jean-Luc was singing; he turned around as they came up behind him and gawked at the wall of dark green leaves and deep red blossoms the size of melons. The stems were thicker than Deanna's thumb in some cases.

"Roses," Walima exclaimed wonderingly. "Like the ones Ian planted for Lwaxana. She had them torn out when he died. But how did they come to be here -- and I've never seen roses grow so *large*."

"Baymei," Deanna said, grinning. "He must have transplanted the roses here. What were you singing, Jean-Luc?"

"A very old song. 'Un grand bonheur qui prend sa place, Les ennuis, les chagrins s'effacent, Heureux, heureux à en mourir, Quand il me prend dans ses bras, Il me parle tout bas, Je vois la vie en rose.'"

"A great happiness which takes the place of troubles, sorrows are erased. . . Happy, happy to die for it, when it takes me in its arms. . . something about speaking low? Life of the rose?"

Jean-Luc gave her one of those amused, dubious looks that preceded a leg-pulling. "You said you were good at languages."

"You stopped giving me French lessons."

He smiled and picked one of the roses, careful not to jab his fingers on thorns. "You did pretty well, actually. I could try singing it in Standard."

"If you were going to sing, you should have packed my ear plugs."

"I'm much better at singing than I was at painting."

Deanna worked at the stem of a red rose the size of her head. "But not as good at it as. . . . Ow! How did you do this without sticking yourself?"

Walima helped them pick roses and put the blossoms in Deanna's arms with the ula blossoms. "Captain, Lwaxana tells me she will be coming to visit you on your ship when the baby is born. Would it be permissible for my sisters and I to come along?"

"Why not? Guests are always welcome -- although you might like to keep in mind that starships tend to respond to dangerous situations. You could find yourself in the middle of a crisis." He tucked a rose behind Deanna's right ear after denuding the stem of thorns. The blossom tickled her temple with wet petals.

"Lwaxana's stories make it sound like quite an adventure. Have you ever encountered a situation as dangerous as facing down three out of six House bitches?"

Deanna sensed his shock at the word choice, and the cynicism. Jean-Luc turned from his harvest of roses and stripped another stem of thorns. "Actually, yes. I hope that I wasn't out of line last night. I would have thought if I had been that one of you would have said something. If I caused any of you difficulty. . . I suppose what I'm trying to ask is whether reparations are necessary, and to whom and how they should be made."

"The Houses may not have any official leverage, but there are enough Betazoids who actually respect the keepers of ancient tradition well enough to talk to people who do have leverage." Walima smiled, but with a sardonic twist of her lip. "I may not have been a part of the House for years, but I still have friends who have, and I know how these things work. What will likely happen is that Lana and her two allies will approach lesser House members in positions of moderate influence in our government. The lesser members who were not there last night, after expressing outrage and making all the right sounds in the presence of their matriarchs, will seek confirmation and clarification -- because as any child of the Houses who has gone out and made something of themselves in the 'real' world will tell you, killing your career for the sake of tradition would be an unrealistic and stupid thing to do. When they seek that clarification, one of the places they will go will be to the Fifth House -- Betazed's Ambassador to the Federation isn't without influence. They will want explanations of the other side before they act. And Jo'fil has an excellent memory, and everyone knows he attends Festivals, so they will ask him. He does the write-up for the news services."

Jean-Luc's stunned expression preceded a few moments of intense thought. "The news will have a transcript of what I said last night?"

Walima chuckled. "Captain, if anything of what you had said were original or shocking, it might be a problem. But others have expressed similar sentiments before. Just not so. . . forcefully. And not in the middle of Alipha -- I have the feeling your interruption in the name of Deanna's welfare may have angered them more than your words. I don't know if they understood why you were doing it."

"I suppose I could have launched into a description of how sensitive she's been throughout the pregnancy -- do you really not understand empathy? Telepaths, I mean. Is it really so different?"

"I'm not sure." Walima inclined her head thoughtfully. "Empathy is not something I am good at. Dihanna seems -- "

"What does that name mean? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt, but the tour guide called her that as well."

Walima glanced at Deanna, amused. "It means 'little star.' I helped Lwaxana pick the guide -- he's a friend of a friend, you could say. He must have heard us talking about her. I used to call her that when she was small -- just a pun on her name. Ian was the first who noticed it."

Jean-Luc's eyebrow twitched, that 'ah-ha' expression that said he'd just stumbled on the key to understanding a mystery, and as they made their way through the woods toward the House he fell into step beside Walima, leaving Deanna to trail along with her armload of flowers. She contained her laughter at his curiosity and Walima's amusement at some of his questions.

The rain had subsided, but renewed itself with vigor as they came out of the woods. Interrupting Walima's description of Deanna's favorite childhood pastimes, Jean-Luc waited for Deanna to catch up and slipped an arm around her. The path, a dark ribbon up the hill between the hedges and shrubs, gleamed wetly under their feet.

"Oh, come out of the rain," Lwaxana called from the back of the House. She and Baymei stood on the steps with a younger man. Baymo, Deanna thought, and the theory was proved correct as they got closer and she could make out the face beneath the cap of dark curls. Her reunion with her cousin was interrupted by Lwaxana's wide-eyed attention to the flowers in Deanna's arms.

"You found them," Baymei said, smiling and putting a hand to his sister's shoulder to steady her. "I couldn't simply let you have them destroyed, Lwaxana, any more than I'd allow you to do away with the pictures. I hope you can forgive me."

Lwaxana took one of the massive red roses from Deanna as she reached the top step. Raindrops showered from the petals over the skirt of her white coat. "Forgive you? I should thank you -- I thought of these so often over the years. Homn -- get us something to put these in!"

The servant hurried inside to comply. Walima greeted Baymo and Baymei warmly, then while speaking to Baymei about the roses she happened to glance at Deanna. "Are you all right, dear."

"Yes. Just a little stunned by all this. It's not what I expected when I came home."

"Poor dear, this is the first Festival we haven't finished," Lwaxana exclaimed in her high-pitched, pretentious way. "It must have been such a shock! Well -- let's just go inside and light that Chalice. I'm sure the Holies will forgive us just this once for doing it a little differently than usual. And after we've said the Litany of Rixx, we'll do something to make Jean-Luc feel a little more at home -- there's a wonderful muddy hill thanks to the rain, and Homn found a *lovely* wheel of cheese at the market yesterday!"

"Wheel of *cheese*?" Walima blurted.

Deanna turned to her husband with a sardonic smile while her mother happily explained to Baymo, Baymei and Walima about human customs and how eccentric they were. Jean-Luc had a wince lingering on his face that looked to be semi-permanent.

{I told you, you can't outdo her. Silly fish. You asked for it.}

He chuckled, to her surprise. {At least Homn didn't find any tomatoes.}

Deanna sighed. This was going to be one of those vacations that defied explanation, as she had thought from the beginning. Shrugging, she took her husband's hand and followed her family inside, careful not to drop any of the flowers she still cradled.

Jean-Luc's smile turned affectionate as they went down the hall of the Fifth House. He nodded at the roses and ula blossoms in her arm. {Too bad the Telistra isn't real. I could have found you one of those, too.}

{I need to learn French, you need to practice your Betazoid.} Leaning, Deanna brushed her lips along his cheek. {You already gave me that flower -- tel'istra means love and trust, without measure.}

{What's the part of that word that means love?}

{You mean what word means love only? There is no such word. We don't imagine love is so simple. There are words for all kinds of combinations -- love and trust, love and passion, even love and anger. But it's never just love. When love is true, it abides in spite of and in addition to, and is never superceded.}

{Confusing.}

She giggled quietly, guiding him into the room her family had already gone into. {You haven't had any difficulty with any of the combinations lately, cher fish. . . .}


End file.
